tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353Mon, 02 Mar 2015 11:28:35 +0000designcartographymiscellaneouscartojunkwebmaptuitionthematiceducationreviewmapchoroplethcartofailcartogrammap galleryolympicCartographic JournalFOSS4GGISconferenceheat maplyricmapprint mapsymbolsuniversityTube mapawardscommentdot densityeventshexagonsisoplethpaperproportionalCartonerdMarauding: to roam in search of people to attack or places to raid. Carto: it's about maps and cartography. Nerd: an intelligent but single-minded, possibly obsessed person who tends to associate with a small group of like-minded people. The title is a phrase (accusation?) used to describe a blog post I once contributed elsewhere that someone took offence to. The fact that they were wrong, not wronged, seemed immaterial so if you can't beat them, join them! I hope I manage to achieve all these.http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/noreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)Blogger117125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-396349979290673678Tue, 24 Feb 2015 21:49:00 +00002015-02-24T16:38:06.336-08:00cartofailcartojunkheat mapMessy heat mapMy last blog post on <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2015/02/when-is-heat-map-not-heat-map.html" target="_blank">heat maps</a> was an attempt to persuade map-makers that the term actually means something other than what you might think it means...and that doing cluster analysis of some form or other on your data more than likely requires a better understanding of data and technique than a so-called heat map generator provides.<br /><div><br /></div><div>My Twitter feed lit up today as Manchester City played Barcelona in the Champions League Round of 16. Lionel Messi, the Barcelona forward, had a fine game by all accounts (to be fair he pretty much always does) and <a href="http://www.squawka.com/" target="_blank">Squawka</a> were on the ball with their live analysis during the game.</div><div><br /></div><div>Squawka provide a web-based view of sport that collates and presents data as it happens. They tweeted the following:</div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-O01f1FFP7ck/VOzq-q0yeHI/AAAAAAAABCY/ulidmCjxUUY/s1600/messiheatmap2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-O01f1FFP7ck/VOzq-q0yeHI/AAAAAAAABCY/ulidmCjxUUY/s1600/messiheatmap2.png" height="640" width="572" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div>Needless to say it brought on a nervous carto-twitch. If you read the previous blog you'll know by now that whatever the above is, it's not a 'heat map'. It's a density map of some form of cluster analysis but it illustrates far more than just another example of an inappropriately named map.</div><div><br /></div><div>Here are some of the issues I see with this map and how similar issues are seen in almost all of these sorts of maps. They may help to understand that it isn't, in fact, a map of Messi leaking all over the pitch.</div><div><br /></div><div>What is the data that was used?</div><div><br /></div><div>Messi presumably ran about the pitch yet the splodges look like they are based on point data. Is this where he had the ball? Where he received the ball? Where he passed the ball to another player? Where he was stationary for a period or simply where he stood watching as Suarez scored the goals? Etc etc. While logic suggests that a map of Messi's running should be linear we are immediately confused in trying to decipher what this data actually represents because it looks like points that have been analysed to create a representation of clusters (more points = larger or more intense splodge). Without knowing what data the map represents we cannot decide whether he was all over the final third or not. If the data is indeed points then is that an appropriate metric and can it justifiably be used to show what they purport the map to be showing?</div><div><br /></div><div>What are the fuzzy splodges?</div><div><br /></div><div>The typical symbology on these sort of maps tends to go through some form of spectral colour scheme and this is no different. The hazy blue splodges are likely where less clustering occurred but is this a fleeting movement or pass or where he tripped over his laces? As Messi moves more or passes more (or whatever more) the intensity of the symbology increases. But what precisely does this represent? We have no legend to tell us what changes in colour mean and whether colour is mapped onto the clustering values linearly or logarithmically or...</div><div><br /></div><div>Indeed - if you look at the overlap of two hazy blue splodges near the bottom centre of the map you'll notice that a simple overlap at the edge of two hazy blue splodges results in a bright, intense change in symbol. But if these hazy blue splodges are built from point data (presumably at the centre of the hazy blue splodge) then the overlap is simply an artifact of overlapping symbology...not necessarily overlapping data. These artifact overlaps occur everywhere on the map so it's unclear what the relationship is between data and symbology and how that then translates to Messi's actual movement or involvement.</div><div><br /></div><div>The statement of being all over the final third also doesn't exactly stack up either. The main splodges are in a zone towards the top of the pitch graphic...a little left of centre but certainly not all in the final third. We'll assume Barcelona are attacking the left half of the pitch graphic and that even though teams switch sides at half-time the graphic maintains teams in the same half for mapping purposes.</div><div><br /></div><div>All in all it's a graphic that reveals very little except gross error and uncertainty and which is utterly impossible to interpret in a way that reveals anything sensible about Messi's contribution to the game.&nbsp;</div><div><br /></div><div>These sort of back of an envelope 'heat maps' are unhelpful for any visual or analytic task. Quick to produce yes, but you can't make any sensible or quantifiable interpretation. Finally, we have no-one elses maps to look at so we simply have to presume that every other player's heat maps are in some way visually inferior to Messi's map.</div><div><br /></div><div>Messy data. Messy clustering. Messy symbology. Messy map. Messy communication and very messy ability to interpret, compare or understand. Poor old Lionel Messi who is, quite literally, an innocent bystander in all of this...as the map, sort of, shows.</div>http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2015/02/messy-heat-map.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-4292340231955316286Wed, 18 Feb 2015 00:17:00 +00002015-02-19T13:46:44.928-08:00cartographyeducationheat mapisoplethtuitionWhen is a heat map not a heat mapActually, the answer to the question in the blog post title is <b>most of the time</b>...<br /><div><br /></div><div>The term 'heat map' has gatecrashed the cartographic lexicon. It has seemingly replaced other, more established, more accurate and perfectly good terms. It's used as a catch all for any map that portrays a density of point-based pieces of information as a surface. Here, I try and explain why I find it unhelpful.<br /><br />Heat maps have become a popularist way to label a surface representation of data that occurs at discrete points. On one hand the search for a better way of showing point based data which avoids death by push-pin is a sound cartographic approach. Imagine simply looking at a map of points and trying to make sense of the patterns. Chief Clarence 'Clancy' Wiggum would certainly struggle to make sense of the pattern of crime in Springfield just from coloured dots.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-drbZ3idGbqQ/VON8bVq11qI/AAAAAAAABA4/Wj880GjO7Tc/s1600/simpsonsdotmap.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-drbZ3idGbqQ/VON8bVq11qI/AAAAAAAABA4/Wj880GjO7Tc/s1600/simpsonsdotmap.png" height="316" width="400" /></a></div><br />It's difficult to process patterns of dots (other than more here, less there) and even harder when you're looking at thousands of dots that overlap (death by pushpin) so...let's make a heat map!<br /><br />In analytical terms there's a number of ways one might approach the problem. One way is to bin your data into regularly shaped containers like hexagons, effectively a spatial summary of the point data. Another way is to interpolate lines of equal value across the map to create a surface which then helps us to see areas that display similarly high or low values across the map. Of course it's important to remember that any interpolated surface is effectively inventing data values for the areas on the map for which you don't have data or sample points. It's therefore important to think whether you want data making up for the areas between your data points when you know damn well nothing exists.<br /><br />For instance, make a map of temperature and you'll likely use sample points. It's perfectly reasonable to infer that temperature exists everywhere as a continuous surface so filling in the voids where you have no data is fine. If, on the other hand, you have accident data for road intersections and you interpolate a surface it makes much less sense. Intersections do not exist across space so filling in the voids with made up data values is not really appropriate.<br /><br />Let's assume Chief Clancy is making a surface based on some sensible logic. These interpolation methods collectively result in an isarithmic map. That is, the planimetric mapping of a real or interpolated three-dimensional surface. So Chief Clancy might see the pattern of crime in Springfield a little more like this (and before someone suggests the interpolation is a little off..yes, it's just for illustrative purposes. I'm a cartonerd but seriously...):<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0HWi_PKLbUU/VOOCD82gRcI/AAAAAAAABBI/ufwAEl2BIX4/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_density.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0HWi_PKLbUU/VOOCD82gRcI/AAAAAAAABBI/ufwAEl2BIX4/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_density.png" height="316" width="400" /></a></div><br />These sorts of isarithmic maps are used everywhere for displaying temperature (isotherm) to atmospheric pressure (isobar); and from height (isohypse) to population distribution (isopleth). They're also commonly, and erroneously, &nbsp;referred to as heat maps.<br /><br />Technically speaking, the map of crime activity points that Chief Clancy is looking at might be termed isometric data since it shows locations of discrete events that do not necessarily exhaust space. The fact that the dots are coloured actually suggests more than one incident. Rather than a simple interpolation of discrete points, he might instead do a kernel density analysis that uses the values at each point as a weighting factor to end up with a map like this:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g5IyhozSOIk/VOOIxKUHSBI/AAAAAAAABBc/DsZGwrMaIeE/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_kernel.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-g5IyhozSOIk/VOOIxKUHSBI/AAAAAAAABBc/DsZGwrMaIeE/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_kernel.png" height="316" width="400" /></a></div><br />His analysis needs to very carefully decide the shape and size of the kernel (search area) used to compare nearest neighbours. A small kernel will create a map that looks much like the original...just discrete points on the map but displayed as splodges. Choosing a kernel that is too large will create an over-smoothed, highly generalised map.<br /><br />A more advanced version of kernel density analysis might be used to calculate a <i>K</i> function which constructs zones around events as a way of summing and weighting values which end up on the interpolated surface. It goes beyond simply looking at nearest neighbours and can help map patterns across a wider area. They're also commonly, and erroneously, &nbsp;referred to as heat maps.<br /><br />Hopefully Clancy knows what he is doing and not simply using a slider in a haphazard manner to achieve a map he likes the look of. There's nothing fundamentally wrong with sliders but it's also useful to know what the slider is doing to make what you're seeing.<br /><br />If Chief Clancy is feeling particularly brave he may even fire up his favourite geo-analytical powerhouse and calculate the&nbsp;Getis-Ord Gi* statistic for the variable in question. The resulting p-values are mapped to show where statistically significant high or low clusters occur spatially.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ThgeBkTx3t8/VOOIxHBMdeI/AAAAAAAABBY/EJr8Tum93GE/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_hotspot.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ThgeBkTx3t8/VOOIxHBMdeI/AAAAAAAABBY/EJr8Tum93GE/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_hotspot.png" height="316" width="400" /></a></div><br />This is often termed a hot spot map (again, sometimes referred to as heat maps) and which typically use red to show 'hot' areas (or a lot of something) and blue to show 'cold' areas (or much less of the thing in question). It doesn't show hot places and cold places and, frankly, if you don't use the right data inputs and know what it's mapping it can distort your view of reality beyond comprehension. It's a map of statistically significant clusters of data based on a multitude of decisions taken in setting the parameters. It's a complex but perfectly good analytical technique though the fact we're now beginning to see the introduction of terms that reflect 'heat' and, often, colours that connotate temperature, it begins to form a basis for misinterpretation.</div><div><br /></div><div>These techniques form a valuable collection of related methods that create interpolated surfaces from discrete data points. They create isarithmic maps; predominantly isopleths because they map distributions of populations of some variable or another. Referring to them as a heat map is wrong because a heat map is something else entirely. Badging them as isarithmic maps is fine but it's important to recognise that they have very different data demands, functionality, complexity and potential and knowing these differences helps you understand and interpret the maps they create.</div><div><br /></div><div>Just for the cartonerds, let's decipher the definition...an isopleth is a form of isarithmic map and shows change in the quantifiable variable over space. They differ from choropleth maps in that the data is not grouped into a pre-defined region (e.g. countries, census areas). They also work particularly well for data that exists continuously and which doesn't necessarily change at an abrupt point or a pre-defined boundary. In this sense, any surface of population based data that can be interpolated from point data is an isopleth. That's ISOPLETH from <i class="Latn mention" lang="en" xml:lang="en">iso-</i>&nbsp;<span class="etyl">Ancient Greek</span> <i class="polytonic mention" lang="grc" xml:lang="grc">ἴσος</i> (<span class="tr mention-tr" lang="" xml:lang="">ísos</span>, <span class="mention-gloss-double-quote">“</span><span class="mention-gloss">equal</span><span class="mention-gloss-double-quote">”</span>) +‎ <span class="etyl">Ancient Greek</span> <i class="polytonic mention" lang="grc" xml:lang="grc">πλῆθος</i> (<span class="tr mention-tr" lang="" xml:lang="">plêthos</span>, <span class="mention-gloss-double-quote">“</span><span class="mention-gloss">a great number</span><span class="mention-gloss-double-quote">”</span>)....or more easily understood as a map that shows equal numbers. The equal numbers being demarcated by isolines of equal value which divide areas which display similar characteristics.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br />So I've hopefully established that isarithmic maps are not heat maps but if we turn our attention to the use of descriptors and colours in such maps it helps to understand the misrepresentation a little more.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div>In all of the example maps Chief Clancy looked at earlier the colour schemes suited the analytical technique. The kernel density maps used single hue colour schemes which went from light to dark. The Getis-Ord Gi* map used a diverging scheme to show clusters of positive p-values (red) and clusters of negative p-values (blue)...though there's no particular reason why red to blue should be used other than to reinforce the use of terms such as 'hot' and 'cold'.<br /><br /></div><div>In all of these maps you can clearly see the areas that represent higher data values and the areas that represent lower data values. It's easy for us because darker shades are interpreted as 'more'. We describe patterns using terms such as 'more' or 'less' rather than 'hot' or 'cold' because that helps us understand the data using language that refers to quantities., 'With diverging colour schemes we naturally interpret the data as diverging away from a central value. &nbsp;Again, 'more' and 'less' is useful as is 'statistically significant cluster' if we're referring to the result of the Getis-Ord Gi* statistic. Using heat related terms adds unnecessary confusion which is further compounded by the colour schemes often used for heat mapping.</div><div><br /></div><div>The idea of showing heat using a rainbow colour scheme is likely based on the sort of colours you get when you 'see' something through an infra-red camera like so:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-j3O-i86I4eM/VN6GcJtwHEI/AAAAAAAAA_k/IZ95JkP196s/s1600/IMG_20150208_102955~2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-j3O-i86I4eM/VN6GcJtwHEI/AAAAAAAAA_k/IZ95JkP196s/s1600/IMG_20150208_102955~2.jpg" height="320" width="306" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div>This technique is specifically designed to measure heat and display hot and cold areas so the use of reds and blues makes sense as it matches the data and the phenomena being mapped. It matches our cognitive ability to process what the colour actually represents. Greens in the middle are still odd though because it doesn't really suggest a mid-heat value. Sometimes these colour schemes avoid green altogether.<br /><br />While this colour scheme arguably works when we're talking of temperature, when the 'mapped' phenomena is actually hotter or colder, transposing this colour scheme for any mapped data variable causes problems in our ability to cognitively process patterns like so:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-74QmMHygs1o/VOOzhQ7yssI/AAAAAAAABBw/3hxIv1uAafo/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_rainbow.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-74QmMHygs1o/VOOzhQ7yssI/AAAAAAAABBw/3hxIv1uAafo/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_rainbow.png" height="316" width="400" /></a></div><br />Here, Chief Clancy is looking at a beautiful rainbow. Blues for colder areas, reds for warmer and yellow and white for, well, white hot areas. The middle is glowing white hot with progressively 'cooler' colours radiating out in a beautifully smoothed gradient. Springfield is on fire and the interpolated values appear to show a lovely linear gradient reflected by the colours. Does the data Clancy is working with vary spatially according to a linear distribution away from source locations? Linear rarely happens in reality so such maps can present a distorted view of what's going on with the underlying data.<br /><br />More likely, such a map presents the results of an over-generalised cluster algorithm that has been combined with the application of a linear spectral colour ramp. Given the point of this blog post, it's not a heat map either...it's just a version of some form of density analysis that results in a surface that does away with isolines altogether and compounds the problems of interpretation by using an unhelpful colour scheme. It's averaged out the analysis and complicated the symbolisation which doesn't help the user task at hand. There's even some transparency thrown in for good measure to see a little of the basemap which also adds to the visual clutter. Of course,defaults can always be changed so let's not get too bogged down in colour choices though using spectral schemes to show quantitative data is never a good idea.<br /><br /></div><div>Clancy needs help but unfortunately the routine use of a red and blue diverging colour schemes and spectral colour schemes on such maps has become so ingrained in popular use that's he doesn't know it's not helping him understand the map particularly well. Why should more of something be 'hotter' and less of something be blue and 'colder'? We're talking about data here...not the weather, though given the <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2013/12/worst-map-of-2013.html" target="_blank">dreadful use of colour schemes on weather maps</a> it's unsurprising we've seen them re-purposed for the sort of maps people call heat maps.<br /><br />Of course, if you move your heat map slider in a different way to define a different implementation of the cluster mapping method and choose different colours you may end up with this:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PpApyY0ny5Q/VOO3B_lPIqI/AAAAAAAABB8/me7_Vw8jjLk/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_rainbow2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-PpApyY0ny5Q/VOO3B_lPIqI/AAAAAAAABB8/me7_Vw8jjLk/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_rainbow2.png" height="316" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Or even this...</div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6K1Qc-kG1yA/VOO3B9_v6PI/AAAAAAAABCA/NcBLXBIZ9V4/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_rainbow3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-6K1Qc-kG1yA/VOO3B9_v6PI/AAAAAAAABCA/NcBLXBIZ9V4/s1600/simpsonsdotmap_rainbow3.png" height="316" width="400" /></a></div><br />Different sized splodges with different colours that tickle your fancy. And all from the same data. What a cornucopia of colour that means, well... very little. And once you've made your data look like something and added some random colours...you can even <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2013/12/the-flawless-map.html" target="_blank">animate it</a>. Doh!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div><br /></div><div>The key to understanding the utility of this type of map is having a good understanding of your data in the first place and choosing an appropriate technique and colour scheme to go with your analysis. While making these type of maps simply is helpful to many, it's also really important to support them in making better maps rather than in allowing them to fall into the trap of making basic mapping errors.</div><div><br /></div><div>So, back to the main point... if none of the above are heat maps...and the misnomer has been reinforced through the use of poorly defined colour ramps...what exactly is a heat map? Does such a thing actually exist?<br /><br />Yes...but strictly speaking it's not really a map; it's a visual representation of a data matrix.<br /><br />A heat map has been around in statistical analysis for a good while. It's defines a graphical approach to code a matrix of data values into a graphical representation using colours. It's designed to reveal the hierarchy of row and column structure. Rows in the matrix are ordered so that similar rows are near each other and you see cluster trees on the axes. A heat map looks like this:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-se2ca1z2dVI/VN6VPL7gMlI/AAAAAAAABAo/2iKe1IHAsbc/s1600/heatmap.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-se2ca1z2dVI/VN6VPL7gMlI/AAAAAAAABAo/2iKe1IHAsbc/s1600/heatmap.png" height="640" width="347" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>The closest spatial representation of data that might reasonably have similarities to a real heat map is a tree map...and that's a cartogram which has destroyed geography for the sake of creating an ordered matrix. At a stretch I understand why raster surfaces used to represent geography might be mistaken as heat maps because they are formed from a rectangular grid of pixels. But as I've set out here, I'd contest that the use of the mapping term isopleth already differentiates it from other map types and that we don't need to borrow a term from graph theory to simply replace one that already suits the technique. Proper heat maps go further than the mis-named cartographic versions anyway because the matrix is designed to illustrate correlations between variables through linked lines and other axis annotation.</div><div><br /></div><div>Want to read more about real heat maps? Check out this rather <a href="http://www.cs.uic.edu/~wilkinson/Publications/heatmap.pdf" target="_blank">good paper</a> by Leland Wilkinson and Michael Friendly who explored the history of the term and of heat maps in 2008 (and from where the above illustration was sourced). It's prior art for heat maps in their true sense.</div><div><br /></div><div>Tempted to make a heat map? I'd suggest doing a density analysis on your point data, experiment with different bandwidths (and understand what it is you're trying to map) and symbolize the resulting surface as an isopleth map using anything other than a rainbow or spectral colour scheme. If you're using a slider and default colours...think about what the slider is doing. Use it sensibly and try and understand how it's interpolating your data and, if you can...change the bloody colours from a rainbow palette! If you can't, then maybe try a different map type altogether.<br /><br />More generally, I find that the introduction of replacement terminology where perfectly good terms already exists creates a further division between what we might call professional cartography and the wider world of map-making. I'd prefer to see those worlds come together under the same umbrella and for a better understanding to emerge through the use of a standard and accurate nomenclature. We don't need to dumb down mapping or how we talk about it to encourage better mapping.<br /><br />PS - with resspect and apologies to The Simpsons whose image I have used and abused in this post.</div><div><br /></div>http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2015/02/when-is-heat-map-not-heat-map.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-5172091613038423557Wed, 14 Jan 2015 18:50:00 +00002015-01-15T11:45:16.394-08:00cartographycommenteducationmiscellaneousCartography is a great word<div class="MsoNormal">Before you start reading, grab a coffee or, possibly, something a little stronger...this is a lengthy stream of thought that I've tried to fashion into something that makes sense. Sometimes it may wander...<br /><br />We’ve all heard, seen (and possibly written) the meme’s that have heralded the death of cartography, the death of the printed map and so forth but these slow-news-month scare stories couldn’t be further from the truth. More maps are made by more people than ever before and if anyone is worrying that print mapping is dead then Mapbox might just have precipitated the second coming with their new <a href="https://www.mapbox.com/blog/high-res-prints-from-mapbox-studio/">printing</a>capabilities. The irony.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">The number of books on maps published in the last year has also rocketed and someone you know was likely spoilt for choice when choosing their 2014 Christmas gift for a map-nerd son or daughter. Plenty of delicious coffee-table books full of great maps are currently available (see <a href="http://www.jonathancrowe.net/2014/11/gift-guide-map-books-of-2014.php">Jonathan Crowe’s review</a> to which I’d add the <a href="http://atlasofdesign.org/">NACIS Atlas of Design</a> and James Cheshire and Oliver Uberti’s superb <a href="http://theinformationcapital.com/">The Information Capital</a> as two of my recent favourites). 2015 looks set to bring more of everything to our browsers, our desktops and our bookshelves. The appetite for maps has never been greater and sure, we see a lot of cartographic crud that we have to wade through but in some senses it makes the gems even more special when you find them. Map-making and the interest in maps, then, is in rude health…but what of cartography? We rarely see mention of ‘cartography’.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Cartography is defined as the discipline dealing with the art, science and technology of making and using maps.&nbsp; The International Cartographic Association (ICA) has recently been accepted as a full member of the International Council for Science (ICSU) which is the international non-governmental organization devoted to international cooperation in the advancement of science. Cartography just graduated but I find that the term and what it stands for remain a term of derision for many. My feeling is we need to re-establish cartography as modern and relevant, because it is.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">There’s no doubt cartography has undergone significant change in the last decade and a number of people have claimed we’d be better off if we just forgot about ‘cartography’ as a definition or as a framework to talk about mapping. Change is nothing new in the mapping sciences because evolution has always radically alter the mechanisms of map-making from time to time. This is usually a technological change (engraving, lithography, computers, cellphones, Google…) which has a massive impact on both the design and production of maps and also the people involved in map-making. New people enter the mapping landscape which both challenges and reinvigorates but it usually goes hand-in-hand with cartographer’s moaning because it usually means they have to retrain, reinvent or let go of ageing techniques. Feeling threatened or at least a little frustrated by change is inevitable if your skills and experience are overtaken so frequently by the new kids on the block. It’s tiring to perpetually invest the energy to keep pace; and also to face the challenge of people trying to constantly rename what it is you do. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Cartography is a word that many new to map-making seem reluctant to use. Not so long ago, up stepped the self-proclaimed ‘neo-cartographers’ whose moniker describes the people and processes of making a map outside of the community of professional map-makers. That’s everyone right? I’ve written about my views of neo-cartography being a fallacy <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2013/03/the-fallacy-of-new-cartography.html">before</a>but don’t we already have a definition that’s relevant? It’s called ‘amateurism’; and before you baulk and rip me to shreds I say that not in a derogatory sense but merely as a perfectly good differentiator. An ‘amateur’ is a person attached to a particular pursuit, study or science in a non-professional way. Amateurs may have little professional training. Many are self-taught. The negative connotations of amateurism mean that sub-par work is often easily explained but that’s also broadly true as most of the time a non-professional will not be able to produce work to the same standard as a professional. So why do we constantly need new terms to describe making and using maps when the word cartography, whether it’s as a professional or amateur pursuit, seems to fit? It’s perfectly acceptable to have professional and amateur cartographers making maps. Many of the best maps were made by amateur cartographers anyway.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">New terminology tends to be sought to describe a movement that wants to be seen as different from the past. New. Fresh. Exciting. Maybe being unencumbered by the perceived shackles of formal training is what defines a neo-spirit but they’re just bringing different skills and new insight to bear to cartography which is no bad thing. The open source movement, Volunteered Geographic Information and Citizen Science have been the backbone of the rise of ‘neo’ because computer scientists and programmers need to have something to programme and geographical data (and lots of it) has coordinates which lend themselves very well to computer processing, particularly if there are other numbers attached to these coordinates. Coders saw geo as a vast untapped marketplace and jumped on the mapping bandwagon…partly because cartography and professional cartographers were too slow to grasp the mettle. There’s a lot of positive work that these ‘amateur cartographers’ (and professional computer scientists) have brought to bear and I don’t disagree that formal definitions of cartography don’t need challenging. But I do take issue with the creation of a new species called neo-cartographer (or whatever) because it seems to go hand-in-hand with decrying what’s gone before while at the same time hyphenating the label to bring a sense of stature to their own efforts. They are fledgling cartographers whether they like it or not, albeit not necessarily in the sense of what has gone before. Rather than embrace cartography they prefer to distance themselves and even become vocal in their anti-cartographic sentiment because for some reason they know best. I got into a brief twitter exchange recently because a ‘designer’ had stood up at a small conference gathering and proclaimed they were a designer and that meant they need not talk with a cartographer because they wouldn’t have anything to add that they couldn’t already better. That arrogance and derision is quite common. My retort was simple…everything is designed and cartographers design maps; so what’s the domain specialism of a generic ‘designer’? Truth is, if the designer had collaborated with a cartographer the map product would likely be far better than sum of the parts anyway. Same goes for your average coder…in fact the same goes for probably 99% of amateur cartographers.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">This issue with the word cartography goes deeper. This is about people’s perceptions and misconceptions of what cartography is and what a cartographer does. Of course, the term cartography isn’t as old as map-making anyway and so the claim that it’s the defining framework for mapping can be plausibly challenged. The term cartography is modern, loaned into English from the French ‘cartographie’ in the 1840s, based on Middle Latin carta "map". While relatively new, it has nevertheless become synonymous with the definition of the art and science of making and using maps. It helps to define a discipline (and now an official science). Yet the public perception of cartography is also awash with a lack of understanding of what a cartographer does. To many, cartographers just make maps ‘pretty’. They are more concerned with finessing the aesthetics of the map than the need to make the damn thing and publish it. Maybe that perception bears fruit in some instances but it’s a gross generalization and most professional cartographers I know take a healthy approach to the graphical marriage of form and function. <o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">And these misconceptions can get quite alarming. I recently had a conversation at Border Control at Los Angeles International airport where the Officer (wearing the obligatory hand-gun and devoid of humour) asked my occupation. I often say something nebulous that will get me through unscathed but increasingly I feel I should just say it as it is so I said ‘cartographer’ when asked my occupation (curiously, despite the fact I have never had the term ‘cartographer’ as part of any job title). Stunned silence ensued and the Officer eventually asked ‘what part of the cars do you fix?’. My British sense of humour wanted to say any number of things but the lack of humour and obligatory hand gun made me pause and simply reply that I made maps. The Officer retorted that she never knew that; so we had a brief conversation about how her map gets on her cellphone and yes, that there are places that still need mapping. After I’d been processed I wished her a pleasant day as I wandered through and pondered on the fact that her impression is probably quite common…and it’s really not that far removed from people’s knowledge and understanding of cartography in the geo and mapping industries themselves. I’m serious. The number of people I know who work in the geo industries who wouldn’t know a decent map if it reared up and bit them on the arse is staggering. Sometimes they make maps. Sometimes they market or herald maps made by others. Mostly they just carry on in their own ignorant way satisfied that their own facts are perfectly OK…and get annoyed if people point out deficiencies. I also recall reading the jacket notes of a book on cartography, published in 2009, that claimed they wrote it because no other books on cartography existed. That’s a blatant lie. Just because you didn’t look very far doesn’t make it a fact. And there’s the problem…people prefer their own facts rather than making the effort to learn those that have already been proven or written. So these negative connotations about cartography begin to blur into personal facts by people predisposed to that argument and view of identity.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">So if you’re a coder, journalist or designer (or anyone new to making maps) and you make maps as part of your work…you’re involving yourself in cartography, but you likely never call yourself a cartographer because of those connotations and perceptions. If you’re going to play in the same sand-pit as other cartographers I propose it would help rekindle respect for the discipline, rather than perpetuate divisions, if you learnt a bit about what being a cartographer is really all about. I don’t propose you take a class because you’ve done that already to become an expert in your own field but appreciate that some have taken classes in cartography and that makes them experts in that field. We can’t all be experts in everything and with such crossover between job requirements these days we inevitably need to tool ourselves in ways that make us amateurs in some things while professional in others.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">The sweeping technological changes and turnover of people at the forefront of cartography means change takes place almost as regularly as fashion but like fashion, most new is actually old and reinvented for a new audience who are simply arriving at their map-making using a different approach. The rise of open this and that has brought this new set of people to the light table who use spatial data as a way to flex their computing muscles or to tell their data-led stories. Modern browsers, new programming languages, SDKs, APIs, open geospatial data and the freedom of the internet created the perfect storm and there were many storm chasers just waiting to jump into the mapping milieu. I recently compared the internet to Mos Eisley spaceport from Star Wars (Episode IV) and the famous Obi-Wan quote “Mos Eisley spaceport. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.” It’s true. The internet has brought wonders but also troubled times for cartography because it has largely tried to denounce it (mostly with terrible maps it must be said). The neos got their mapping hands dirty but also made cartography a little grubby in their dismissal of much that had gone before. The mindset of many of these amateurs has sullied cartography because the quality of the result rarely matters even though there’s been some beautifully disruptive gems amongst the general mess that’s been created. But here’s the sting…the more these amateurs work with maps, the more their work matures and the less they remain amateurs – they become part of the profession through practice and experience. No one ever said you have to have qualifications to be a professional. On-the-job experience counts for a lot if you’re willing to learn, develop and develop knowledge and understanding to go along with your experience.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Because change is inevitable (and why should we stop anyone from having a go or getting involved in map-making anyway?), it’s beholden on cartographers and those geospatial experts who know something about high quality, meaningful mapping and data visualization to accept change because it’s part of the territory. It’s not particularly unique to cartography either so the idea that we get a raw deal is perhaps simply part of a stereotypical view of reality. The fact is, change happens and it happens rapidly. Becoming part of the change, being the change you want and working to ensure the fundamental basis of cartography is retained is vitally important. If we leave cartography to the amateurs we’re running the risk of leaving behind all the good stuff for short-term gain, reinvented techniques and an approach that tends to prefer butting heads with convention rather than embracing it and making good use of it.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">I’m simplifying and generalizing of course (it’s what cartographers do) but the brain and skill drain is palpable in much of what we see in cartography. Academic programmes are largely gone or where they do exist they’re seen as too theoretical and not practical enough (by neos) or are too far down the buttonology road to be considered ‘proper’ courses (by academic cartographers). National Mapping Agencies have had to rapidly alter their course to take advantage of new approaches. Maps are now personalized and mostly we default to the ubiquitous offerings on our desktops or mobile devices…and we consume transient maps about this whimsical topic or that fanciful theme daily. And cartographers still moan. We’ve got to get with it as much as we want our new map-making friends to get with it. Embrace change but work to promote what cartography is, how it can be inclusive, not exclusive and what knowledge and skills one might reasonably expect a cartographer to possess as they develop from amateur to professional. That may render some people as perpetual amateurs but that shouldn’t be negative. We are all amateurs at something or other (sport, cooking, writing…).<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">In pondering how to encourage people to value cartography; to encourage cartographers to stand up for their profession and expertise; and show those new to map-making what cartography is about I was inspired by some parallels in the debate on User Interface design (UI) and User Experience (UX). Up until only a few years ago you’d never hear of a job title with either UI or UX in it, let alone in combination with the ultra-trendy ‘designer’ or ‘architect’ monikers. These labels have even entered the mapping domain…map designer, map architect etc (never cartographic designer or cartographic architect you’ll note). As a tangent, it’s an improvement to ‘GIS cartographer’ or someone who can make ‘GIS maps’. What is that? I digress. It’s meaningless, that’s what; and it demonstrates if you’re hiring that you don’t really know what it is you want or need. So what of the label of cartographer? It’s a perfectly good label but it carries baggage (to wit…the moaning guys hunched over draughtsman’s tables with pens). Erik Flowers’ excellent look at the differences between how User Experience wants to be seen and how it is seen (<a href="http://www.uxisnotui.com/">www.uxisnotui.com</a>) has many parallels in how cartography and cartographers are viewed and how they might wish to be viewed. His thesis is, effectively, that UX is poorly understood, that people don’t really understand what it means and, consequently, they have little idea of the scope of work that a User Experience Designer might be capable of. He’s right. And one could argue that this is the problem that faces cartographers and cartography whether we’re talking about Border Control Officers or the latest neo-map-hacker. Flowers produced this fantastic sheet that explains in very simple terms how UX wants to be seen and how it is typically seen:<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rbA2y6981gA/VLa4gSdx-PI/AAAAAAAAA-w/PgluCH5KBdo/s1600/uxisnotui.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rbA2y6981gA/VLa4gSdx-PI/AAAAAAAAA-w/PgluCH5KBdo/s1600/uxisnotui.png" height="392" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">The point of Flowers’ list is to try and debunk what a User Experience expert is, what their skillset and expertise is and what roles they are able to fill. Some are entire jobs or careers and some are perhaps a little more transient but what he wants you to realize is that UX designers are not just people who do UI design or who think the world can be solved through UI design. He wants you to appreciate that there is much more to being a UX expert than many might immediately think.</div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal">So I made a similar list for cartography and the sort of expertise and roles cartographers are involved in.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b>How cartography might be seen<o:p></o:p></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9EY71cqkpgg/VLa4XLvbkwI/AAAAAAAAA-g/-MjhhUo-fVQ/s1600/whatiscartographyWORDLE.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-9EY71cqkpgg/VLa4XLvbkwI/AAAAAAAAA-g/-MjhhUo-fVQ/s1600/whatiscartographyWORDLE.png" height="338" width="640" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><br /></b></div><br /><div class="MsoNormal">Before you claim that not every professional cartographer wants to be seen like this let me be clear…I agree. The list is of expertise and skills that cartographers will possess in different combinations and to different levels. Possibly not every cartographer can claim they are proficient in every part of this list (actually, I’d be wary of any that do) but it shows the breadth and depth of the cartographic profession.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">And on the other hand, the following version of the same list is generally the way in which cartographers tend to be viewed: as an ill-defined, nebulous group of grumpy people who tend to just make maps and complain about everyone else’s maps, note the perception of this has also seen a subtle change from the word critique (constructive, supportive, rigorous and justified) to Police (simply critical). And yeah…it’s in Comic Sans.<b><o:p></o:p></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b>How cartography is generally seen</b><o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><br /></b></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OfqSMit8H9g/VLa4Xd3npoI/AAAAAAAAA-k/1d7cbj0Xt48/s1600/whatiscartographyWORDLEv2.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-OfqSMit8H9g/VLa4Xd3npoI/AAAAAAAAA-k/1d7cbj0Xt48/s1600/whatiscartographyWORDLEv2.png" height="338" width="640" /></a></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><br /></b></div><div class="MsoNormal"><b><br /></b></div><div class="MsoNormal">This is an unfortunate situation but I’d challenge anyone within the cartographic community to refute that this is how many others look at us and what we do. It’s no wonder people claim all we do is colour in with computers (a phrase my old Dean of Faculty used in describing the geo, GIS and cartography courses at Kingston University…he’s risen to Senior Deputy Vice-Chancellor while GIS and geo have all but closed…terrible sign of the times). But these sort of narrow-minded people never seem to really understand or want to understand what it is that a cartographer brings to the table. In fact, you’ll see this lack of understanding permeate across job adverts and specifications and even within organisations that should know better. Whose fault is this though? Well I began this by complaining that cartographers simply complain and in many respects I feel that as a community we have largely been the architects of this perception. Where once cartographers were Royal appointments they are now backroom staff and, to be frank, you’re likely to need to be a coder or something else first and foremost and an amateur cartographer second. The ability to know how to make a map is tangential to many other job requirements. It’s also the case that when you make a map many employers wouldn’t know the difference between a good and poor map anyway. Quality is low on the list of priorities for many. Speed and turnover is more useful. And so the path to the dark side is complete as apprentice becomes the master. A new order is formed that eschews the past and leads to the rise of an alternative with a new mindset. Yes, I’m using a Star Wars analogy again which even had those on the good side like Han Solo mocking the Jedi: “Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for a good blaster at your side, kid.” Trouble is…actually, most people side with the Jedi in Star Wars and ultimately appreciate it. Good triumphs evil. Just like the Jedi, cartography gets bashed about a fair bit from time to time but it needs to reinvigorate, return and prevail as the way in which we set out the cartographic order in our universe.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">We’re currently awash with neologisms because, frankly, if you’re a new player in the mapping landscape you want to be seen as new, avant garde. You want to make your mark and not be viewed as simply regurgitating the cruddy old stuff you think cartographer’s of yesteryear hold so dear. Neologisms such as GIS mapper, map-maker, map designer and…neo-cartographer. In fact, you’ll have to hunt hard to find any ‘modern’ map-maker wanting to use the simple term cartographer to describe what it is they do. These neologisms have become personas. They take on new meaning as they attempt to shake off the past and define a new set of skills and expertise. They also define a way to divide the past from the present but that, to my mind is simply divisive for the sake of it. Why does everything have to be seen as new? Why is there such a determination for people to want to break from the past and to differentiate themselves so markedly. There are clearly now improved ways of doing cartography that replace older ways but it’s evolutionary, not revolutionary. Does the fact I can’t code in Javascript or I prefer to make a map using a GUI rather than code up CSS make me a bad cartographer? No. It just means I do my work a different way. The International Cartographic Association’s definition of cartography covers it I think. Let’s not reinvent what it is and let’s accept amateurs as well as professionals and see them as bringing different things to the table. Let’s also try and ensure the rest of the world understands cartography and what it is to be a cartographer a little better. And that starts with the geo-professions more broadly developing a better understanding of the broad church of cartographic expertise and practice rather than constantly trying to avoid it, ignore it or reinvent what it is they do.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">My point is simple (despite the lengthy essay)…whether we call it cartography or not (and we should call it cartography), cartographers have much to offer. They are rarely seen as people that have such a varied skillset as I’ve set out here but I would encourage us to shift our thinking. Being a cartographer is a fine profession. What needs to happen is to explain far better to people what we do. We need to go beyond simply saying ‘I make maps’ because that reinforces the stereotypes. We need to avoid infighting between those who prefer to print their maps and those who prefer to code. We need to accept that some make maps using GIS software and some use Illustrator and Photoshop. You know what…some people use a wide range of approaches and I have Esri software, Adobe products, QGIS and Tilemill installed on my computer. I use ArcGIS a lot (inevitably, I’m paid to…though in the past this has been by choice also). I also have Mapbox and CartoDB accounts. It’s allowed.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Beyond the different ways in which we approach the craft, we can start re-establishing cartography by encouraging people inside and out to acknowledge the expertise a cartographer can offer and see them as vital in an organizational context. ICA are making efforts to underpin this with the designation (by the United Nations Committee of Experts on Global Geospatial Information Management) of 2015-2016 as <a href="http://internationalmapyear.org/">International Map Year</a> which is formally launched at the <a href="http://www.icc2015.org/">27<sup>th</sup> International Cartographic Conference</a> in Rio de Janeiro in August. My good friend, current ICA President Georg Gartner has also written in a similar vein recently on <a href="http://www.esri.com/esri-news/arcnews/winter1314articles/the-relevance-of-cartography">The Relevance of Cartography</a> and <a href="http://www.esri.com/esri-news/arcnews/fall14articles/challenges-to-cartography">Challenges to Cartography</a>. As cartographic professionals, we all need to help develop a better public image; one that encourages amateur cartographers to see themselves as such (or as working towards becoming professional) and that allows people more generally to understand how the map on their mobile phone arrived there. It’s not magic. It’s cartography. It's a great word so let's embrace it.<o:p></o:p></div><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal">Postscript: I'm no longer Editor of The Cartographic Journal after a 9 year stint but if I were...this would be the first Editorial of 2015.<br /><br />Postscript 2: Well done if you got to the end. I hope it's provoked some thinking.</div><br /><div class="MsoNormal"><br /></div>http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2015/01/cartography-is-great-word.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-4283913492922202348Mon, 15 Dec 2014 22:22:00 +00002014-12-17T13:56:17.943-08:00cartographymapmap galleryreviewFavourite maps from 2014I'll get to my favourite maps from 2014 in a moment but first a few thoughts...<br /><br />My impression of much of what we've seen in 2014 is that web mapping is maturing. Neo is not so neo any more. There are still plenty of ghastly mashups, nonsensical efforts and collections of '40 maps that will change your mind on something you never cared about anyway' but there's better quality too. While 2013 seemed to be the year when everyone was simply trying to out-score each other with different map styles, 2014 has seen less of that trend. Perhaps we're getting a little bored of the fact you can colour in your map a million different ways. Maybe we're moving a little away from the preoccupation with form (nice to look at) and beginning to see function reappear as a key reason for a map to be made.<br /><br />The trend of mapping data from social media does, however, seem to be continuing unabated. Most commentators agree that Twitter data, for instance, is just plain dreadful with so much error, bias and uncertainty as to make it practically useless for teasing out meaningful trends. I've yet to see a well made map of Twitter data though technologically we're seeing some impressive data processing efforts to get the data on the map. It's a start but finding more nuanced ways of revealing something useful needs to be the next step.<br /><br />Big data is still a buzzword but so often used inappropriately. As one of my colleagues said earlier in the year "if it fits on a portable drive it isn't big data so #$%* off". Maps are not exempt from the trend to simply map more and larger datasets and a key challenge is to re-think ways of representing millions of features on a map so as to make the map readable and to encode some message or meaning into the map. It's simply not good enough throwing a whole heap of data onto a map and expecting it to work, just because it's technically feasible to do so. Without cartography it's just a visual data dump even if you've coloured it in.<br /><br />That brings me onto cartography in general. We're still seeing a marginalisation of cartography and cartographers by the avant-garde, the so-called new mapmakers. They seem, generally, to be more comfortable and less combative in the mapping space than a year or so ago (maturity again) but recognising so much of what has gone before still seems to elude many and they're still fond of reinvention. On the other hand, it's also true that cartographers still fail in reaching out and explaining their craft more widely. We are experts in our art and science and have a duty to share that with a society hungry for maps and mapping but I still see far too many who just sit back and watch from the sidelines. How many blogs do you see from real, proper cartographers? Why do we still hide good quality cartographic research in academic journals? This latter point may seem somewhat ironic given I just stepped down from editing one such journal but I've become increasingly uncomfortable with the journal as a sole means of disseminating research. If you've got something to say - say it to the people who need to know; and they're likely not the ones reading that academic journal. That said it's been pleasing to see some recent changes to how news-related blog sites report on cartographic work. There's less of the hysterical reporting of some latest greatest map (that likely isn't) and some good reporting of real cartographic work. Citylab have been doing this well recently.<br /><br />2015 should see more development in the 3D space with improvements in the way in which data can be visualized more easily and responsively in web browsers. This being the case, it's incumbent on us to properly harness the potential of 3D and not simply use it for the sake of using it. In the same way that I've yet to see a real use for Torque animations (flashing lights showing where people tweet being the biggest culprit...stop press, actually <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2014/12/15/the-alcatraz-escapees-could-have-survived-and-this-interactive-model-proves-it/?tid=hp_mm&amp;hpid=z3" target="_blank">this use</a> showing Alcatraz escapee survival chances begins to use it meaningfully) it's also true that 3D is often used for no good reason. If data is truly temporal and has important characteristics that a temporal depiction can show then design to show that. If there is value in delivering the data to make some additional and purposeful use of the third-dimension then great - but there's more pitfalls to mapping both the temporal and third dimensions that need to be assessed to make the map work.<br /><br />I'd also like 2015 to be a year in which cartography becomes just a little more recognised for its worth as a discipline and a profession. It seems we've been trying to get &nbsp;everyone to think and work like cartographers for years but I'm not convinced this is the right approach. They're all busy trying to be professionals in their own areas. It also seems that for this to work, it would require a very rigid rules-based approach to allow people to follow to get to the end map (literally mapping by numbers). While many cartographic rules (I prefer to call them guidelines) exist to lead people down the right path, experimentation is playing a big part in modern cartography. It always has if truth be told. Some of this is in the academic space; some in the hacking space; but both modes of design and production are useful. Cartography is a profession and cartographic professionals are knowledgeable and practiced. They have a lot to offer. I firmly believe collaboration is key and I've long said that there's an important distinction between a professional and an amateur in any discipline or profession. I don't use the word amateur in a derogatory sense either - it's used to differentiate someone who is not formally trained, educated or practiced in a particular realm. We're all professionals at something and we're all amateurs at far more besides. Recognising that and collaborating with professionals from another area is likely to yield results that are greater than the sum of the parts. It might also save you time and frustration!<br /><br />In a personal sense I made a <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/i-would-map-500-miles.html" target="_blank">frivolous map</a> this year (the Proclaimers 500 miles nonsense) that got more hits to my blog (12,000) than virtually everything else I have ever done put together. It's possibly the worst piece of work I've ever done. It's not even a proper map. That's how frustrating and disappointing the internet can be.<br /><br />So with that mini-review/rant out of the way, let me run through a few of my favourite maps from 2014. I was politely waiting for others to post their own lists but I got bored waiting so thought I'd rustle up my choices. They're an eclectic set but as I've spent the year writing a daily blog on the ICA Map Design Commission blog it's been a relatively easy process to narrow down my favourites this year.<br /><br /><b>In Flight by Kiln</b> (click image for web map)<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2014/aviation-100-years" target="_blank"><img alt="http://www.theguardian.com/world/ng-interactive/2014/aviation-100-years" border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FzQuUriz9Dw/VI9SpNvkVeI/AAAAAAAAA7c/tTa8AR2O6Fg/s1600/MapCarte25_kiln.png" height="275" width="400" /></a></div><br />The idea of telling stories with maps is not new. The re-emergence of this genre through the medium of the web with the compilation of related multimedia to create a narrative has been a big story itself in 2014. This effort in The Guardian's web site remains one of the best framed I've seen. Simple idea. Good content. Not over-produced.<br /><br /><b>Barclays Cycle Hire</b> by Ollie O'Brien<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cO4z4JMfS9E/VI9TfYle_cI/AAAAAAAAA7k/Xi4g1iqx0vI/s1600/MapCarte81_obrien_cover.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-cO4z4JMfS9E/VI9TfYle_cI/AAAAAAAAA7k/Xi4g1iqx0vI/s1600/MapCarte81_obrien_cover.png" height="400" width="303" /></a></div><br />Ollie's been doing some great work with the London Bicycle hire data, particularly with some online mapping. I really like this static representation which&nbsp;BMJ used the map as their cover art to highlight a paper that explored the health benefits of the bikeshare scheme compared to other forms of transport. It's a simple flow map but simple often works very well and the saturated red of the routes is a clear metaphor for a blood capillary network and resonates well as cover art. Ollie even chose to exclude all other detail except for the iconic River Thames in the style of Beck's underground map.<br /><br /><b>Tokyo</b> by Benjamin Sack<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sdRicGpzBFY/VI9VG7j3FGI/AAAAAAAAA7w/O-6pU0vCtjY/s1600/MapCarte197_tokyo.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-sdRicGpzBFY/VI9VG7j3FGI/AAAAAAAAA7w/O-6pU0vCtjY/s1600/MapCarte197_tokyo.png" height="292" width="400" /></a></div><br />A black and white, printed map. There's still space in a list like this for a terrific perspective drawing of Tokyo that when viewed close-up shows incredible detail. No fancy web controls here...just beautiful cartography that builds off a fine legacy of illustrative bird's eye views.<br /><br /><b>Breathing City</b> by John Cherdarchuk<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://darkhorseanalytics.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/nyBreathe.gif" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://darkhorseanalytics.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/nyBreathe.gif" height="400" width="287" /></a></div><br />A simple concept that does manage to use animation to good effect to show how New York City's population structure changes over a 24 hour period. There's a lot of data in here but it's represented with clarity and the animation brings to life the ebb and flow. the moving graph helps to contextualize the work.<br /><br /><b>One dot for every Starbucks</b> by David Yanofsky<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RCTw_6ysl4w/VI9Wx57ELSI/AAAAAAAAA78/uwANZ64aJhM/s1600/MapCarte201_starbucks.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-RCTw_6ysl4w/VI9Wx57ELSI/AAAAAAAAA78/uwANZ64aJhM/s1600/MapCarte201_starbucks.png" height="400" width="331" /></a></div><br /><br />Mapping cities at the same scale is important to support the cognitive process of visual comparison. It's as simple as using the right projection...or using small multiples and mapping the same phenomena at the same scale. I like the way small multiples supports the process of visual comparison in this map. It helps that there are so many Starbucks outlets that the structure of each city is well defined.<br /><br /><b>NYC Taxis: A day in the life</b> by Chris Whong (click image for web map)<br /><a href="http://nyctaxi.herokuapp.com/" target="_blank"><br /></a><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><a href="http://nyctaxi.herokuapp.com/" target="_blank"><img alt="http://nyctaxi.herokuapp.com/" border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ghcWF6N9mtw/VI9Xm-_hSdI/AAAAAAAAA8E/K-cp5meMbPw/s1600/MapCarte204_NYCtaxi.png" height="292" width="400" /></a></span></div><br />A large dataset brought to life by focusing on a single entity at a time. This moving map takes you on a journey of a single New York City taxi cab. It shows a range of useful information including fares and a timeline. A lovely piece of work that works well, marries form and function and shows us what web mapping can be.<br /><br /><b>The United States: Her natural &amp; industrial resources</b> by Stephen Smith<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ykv1yJoYfuA/VI9YIB97siI/AAAAAAAAA8M/VSolsDhL9Z0/s1600/MapCarte208_smith.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ykv1yJoYfuA/VI9YIB97siI/AAAAAAAAA8M/VSolsDhL9Z0/s1600/MapCarte208_smith.png" height="293" width="400" /></a></div><br />Stephen based his modern version of the U.S. on a mid-century map of the United Kingdom. He did so with a keen eye and shows that modern maps don't have to constantly reinvent to be eye-catching and purposeful. He perfected a beautiful aesthetic and gave life to his data.<br /><br /><b>Skintland</b> by The Economist<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eTL2lQEGNWA/VI9ZRq_271I/AAAAAAAAA8Y/1-54gml83mc/s1600/MapCarte261_skintland.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-eTL2lQEGNWA/VI9ZRq_271I/AAAAAAAAA8Y/1-54gml83mc/s1600/MapCarte261_skintland.png" height="400" width="303" /></a></div><br /><br />You can't beat a bit of satire in cartography and the shapes of maps gives artists a perfect canvas upon which to create something new and provocative. The Scottish vote for independence was too good an opportunity to miss and The Economist did a great job in creating this satirical map for their front cover.<br /><br /><b>The Milford Track</b> by Roger Smith/Geographx<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Roqcpwsy-do/VI9bMD5wDiI/AAAAAAAAA8s/z3oX0cD06nA/s1600/MapCarte274_milford.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Roqcpwsy-do/VI9bMD5wDiI/AAAAAAAAA8s/z3oX0cD06nA/s1600/MapCarte274_milford.png" height="400" width="282" /></a></div><br /><br />Pseudo-natural looking depiction supports this map's primary function for wayfinding. It's a map for walkers. The fact it's printed on rock (yes, rock!) makes it practically indestructable as well. The hill-shading and deep, rich colours gives this map a somewhat unique visual appeal but different is good in this case. Fine, detailed contour lines and expertly designed and positioned typographic elements makes it work well as well as looking great.<br /><br /><b>Canyonlands National Park</b> by Tom Patterson<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-b2IgBMFixiE/VI9aU_X8D2I/AAAAAAAAA8g/RsjuINRjHjQ/s1600/MapCarte282_canyonlands.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-b2IgBMFixiE/VI9aU_X8D2I/AAAAAAAAA8g/RsjuINRjHjQ/s1600/MapCarte282_canyonlands.png" height="282" width="400" /></a></div><br />Tom Patterson's beautiful cartography once again shines in this exquisite depiction of the terrain morphology and colours of the landscape. Realistic rendering of the terrain captures not only the vertical component but also something of the horizontal structure and bedding to give an impression of rock texturing synonymous of historic, manually drawn relief and rock shading. There's a lot going on in the creation of this map but the devil is in the detail and it's the detail that makes this so easy on the eye.<br /><br /><b>London: The Information Capital </b>by James Cheshire and Oliver Uberti<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-RrEvvmbB1TU/VI9bv7ZPE8I/AAAAAAAAA80/NNxrPbyPjBw/s1600/MapCarte303_cheshire1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-RrEvvmbB1TU/VI9bv7ZPE8I/AAAAAAAAA80/NNxrPbyPjBw/s1600/MapCarte303_cheshire1.png" height="356" width="400" /></a></div><br />Not a map...but a book of maps. This really is a stunning collection of beautiful maps about all manner of different aspects of London and its populus. Each map has been carefully crafted to make the best use of the data and to speak to the theme of the map itself. Picking out one or two maps doesn't do it justice so here's a tip - go buy it. This is modern thematic cartography at its absolute best.<br /><br />This is a top ten of sorts but honourable mentions to the following which on another day I might have easily put in this list:<br /><br />Plan oblique relief Europe by Jonas Buddeberg, Bernhard Jenny &amp; Johannes Liem<br />Space Station Earth by Eleanor Lutz<br />Columbia River watershed by Jake Coolidge<br />Lake Wakatipu by Simon Bardsley<br /><br />All of these maps have got a fuller write-up on the <a href="http://mapdesign.icaci.org/" target="_blank">ICA Map Design Commission blog</a> this year. They contain large images and links where appropriate.<br /><br />That's it for 2014, unless someone publishes something fantastic in the next 15 days. I'm also looking forward to everyone else's lists. They're bound to be different which is part of the subjective beauty of cartography. I'm also likely to have missed some.<br /><div><br /></div><br /><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/12/favourite-maps-from-2014.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-1429530027623826350Mon, 08 Dec 2014 18:15:00 +00002014-12-08T10:25:44.062-08:00Cartographic JournalcartographypaperTube mapBecksploitationWhen one thinks of a map depicting London, generally the image that appears is that of the map designed by Henry (Harry) Beck (1902 – 1974).<br /><br />&nbsp; <a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-rtgwzXgPI0o/VIXjkuUnOvI/AAAAAAAAA7I/-2eW7dz2C8A/s1600/Figure5.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-rtgwzXgPI0o/VIXjkuUnOvI/AAAAAAAAA7I/-2eW7dz2C8A/s1600/Figure5.png" height="280" width="400" /></a><br /><br />&nbsp;It has become a design icon despite the fact that it eschews topography (other than the River Thames) and focuses on the simplified depiction of the topology of the Underground rail network. Beck’s map, designed in 1931, and first made available to London commuters in 1933, has become the image of the geography of London and, generally, the mental map that defines how London ‘works’.<br /><br />Station names have become synonymous with the above-ground landscape and the network is such that most of London’s landmarks can be readily located through the map.&nbsp; Navigating between them is a simple process and while the city above is a socio-economic and cultural soup, the simplicity of the map brings a sense of order, structure and sensibility. It is a perfect counterpoint to the chaos at street level.<br /><br />In cartographic terms, Beck’s map works and marries form with function perfectly. It retains the status of ‘the’ map of London and manages to simplify the network, be harmonious, coherent, balanced and all with minimal topographic distortion. The symbols are clear and well crafted; the composition and layout, though somewhat challenged by network changes since 1933, remains useful; and the design has remained relatively unchanged over the last 80 years which creates stability in appearance and breeds confidence in its use.<br /><br />However, in our recently published paper, William Cartwright and I assert that Beck’s map is over-used in myriad ways beyond the reason for its invention. The effect of such abuse has perhaps been to dilute its own place in cartographic history.<br /><br />There have been many official iterations that have not always successfully married Beck’s design ideas with network changes; other metro maps have often tried to imitate but with mediocre success; and the map is perpetually used as a template for mimics and alternatives.<br /><br />The map has become a model for parody which we assert is bad for the map and bad for cartography. We've even created an ironic tube map of tube maps that acts as a monument to all of the maps we've found - over 220 of them. It's called End of the Line and you can view the full web map <a href="http://arcgis.com/apps/StorytellingTextLegend/index.html?appid=79f937917c5d475a87e580c6eccd1937" target="_blank">here</a> or explore an embedded version below.<br /><br /><br /><iframe frameborder="0" height="400" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://carto.maps.arcgis.com/home/webmap/embedViewer.html?webmap=84a606bfb3d848c69ca61321f3ac2e9f&amp;extent=-0.5539,51.4142,0.0729,51.6763" width="500"></iframe> <br /><br />You can view the published paper <a href="http://www.maneyonline.com/doi/abs/10.1179/0008704114Z.000000000150" target="_blank">here</a> (charges apply if you're not a subscriber to the Journal)<br /><br />Or, you can download the FREE pre-print version of the paper <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B74oo5QGpleoVi1Ya1hTNms4REE/view?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here</a>http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/12/becksploitation.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-5822111576213909588Thu, 02 Oct 2014 03:27:00 +00002014-10-02T09:13:00.522-07:00cartographydesignhexagonssymbolswebmapThe cartography of Luminocity 3DI've just had a good look at <a href="http://luminocity3d.org/" target="_blank">Luminocity 3D</a> by <a href="https://twitter.com/citygeographics" target="_blank">Duncan Smith</a> of CASA, Bartlett UCL. I'm impressed.<br /><br />Web mapping is beginning to show signs of getting beyond the infantile and maturing from its pubescent phase and this example shows what can be achieved when you consider the entire user experience.<br /><a href="http://luminocity3d.org/#population_density_2011/7/52.600/-2.500" target="_blank"><br /></a><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://luminocity3d.org/#population_density_2011/7/52.600/-2.500" target="_blank"><img alt="http://luminocity3d.org/#population_density_2011/7/52.600/-2.500" border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-3RUNZpXnkDE/VCwy_zx7LEI/AAAAAAAAA5k/7f2O7vzOoG0/s1600/luminocity3.png" height="288" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br />The maps are clean and well produced and there are plenty of them to support the inquiring mind, each accessible from a sensible tabbed box in the upper right. There's a permanent legend in the bottom right with not only a clear illustration of the chosen classification and shading schemes but a short description to assist interpretation. Nice to see data attribution and sources cited too. The title panel is sensible and although containing all the usual share and contact buttons is relatively unobtrusive. The graph in the bottom left is a masterstroke - it's linked to the map so we get a good scattergraph overview of the data distribution. Hovers provide the data summary and clicking a component in the graph orients the map appropriately. I really like the use of subtle graphical cues such as a slight animation to show an active element, or the emerging horizontal or vertical lines to anchor your eyes to the x or y axis. Likewise, hover controls on the map also deliver data summaries and the addition of a graphical yellow glow also gives focus. The ability to switch labels on and off easily also gives both unencumbered and contextual view of the map.<br /><br />I also like the use of data re-apportionment into a consistent regularly tesselated grid which overcomes the problems of trying to use different geographies. It also makes moving between maps easier and supports visual comparisons more readily.<br /><br />All that said, I'm going to get picky (because that's the purpose of the blog). I found myself frustrated by some of the cartographic choices.<br /><br />Firstly, while diverging colour schemes tend to make a map look more interesting (more colours) it doesn't fit the data in a cognitive sense. Most of the datasets would benefit from a single hue progression or similar. Most of the variables are mapped with some arbitrary break defined where one colour morphs into another yet the importance of that critical middle value is never established. Is it important? The use of a diverging colour scheme suggests so but it is unlikely.<br /><br />In fact, perusing through the maps shows an inconsistency in the graphical treatment. Most are diverging, some are single hue, others are multi-spectral (agh!).<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-GXzsfY7YkC0/VCwzQHuLYlI/AAAAAAAAA5w/HhdE-oD9q14/s1600/luminosity4.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-GXzsfY7YkC0/VCwzQHuLYlI/AAAAAAAAA5w/HhdE-oD9q14/s1600/luminosity4.png" height="288" width="400" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hmKUe9a8SXE/VCwy_4GEB0I/AAAAAAAAA5g/SXHNhAF13uc/s1600/luminocity1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hmKUe9a8SXE/VCwy_4GEB0I/AAAAAAAAA5g/SXHNhAF13uc/s1600/luminocity1.png" height="288" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br />Second, while the use of a regular grid is great the use of 3D on most of the maps is distracting. It's effectively a plan oblique representation of the hexagonal grid using a second variable to map population or employment density. Fine in principle and allows the map to remain planimetric (thus preserving scale across the map) but where you see large numbers of tall prisms it inevitably obscures a lot of detail behind. Prism maps have always suffered this limitation and I can understand that mapping the second variable gives us an important additional piece of information but it's questionable whether the cost of occlusion warrants it. The answer would be to include an ability to view the map from multiple orientations either through a rotate tool or just giving us, say, four of the cardinal compass directions. At least that way the map reader can see what's behind a block of prisms through map interaction.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-N2Z-gO4WemA/VCwy_OH55gI/AAAAAAAAA5Y/zDjk1wgHfgA/s1600/luminocity2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-N2Z-gO4WemA/VCwy_OH55gI/AAAAAAAAA5Y/zDjk1wgHfgA/s1600/luminocity2.png" height="321" width="400" /></a></div><br /><br />Finally, the map works on multiple devices and some of the overlying boxes can be minimized - but not all. This does create a cramped feel on some devices and it would be nice for there to be more control over the position and visibility of these.<br /><br />Like I said, I'm being picky but I'd like to see the cartography match the levels of the overall app, particularly in the use of colour.http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/10/the-cartography-of-luminocity-3d.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-6321020546853719477Tue, 30 Sep 2014 16:21:00 +00002014-09-30T09:21:38.641-07:00cartographycartojunkdesignPretzel crust cartographyI saw an ad on television last night that may help the understanding of how cartographers think about good map design and construction vs what we perceive as poor map design and construction. It was for a new Pretzel Crust pizza available at Little Caesars. It's constructed with a pretzel crust as the base (poor basemap for a pizza in my opinion) and then goes on to slop on a thick yellow cheese sauce instead of a tomato based sauce (odd choice, gloopy and lacking taste), before topping it off with four more cheeses and pepperoni (solid choice for a final topping but a bit out of place on the base).<br /><br />Take a look and you decide whether any of this should be allowable on a pizza. The pizza appears at about 16 seconds...by 20 seconds I'd hope you won't want one...by 26 seconds I'm hoping you're wondering what the hell they were on when they invented it. If you're thinking yum, gotta go get one now then you may as well not read any more of this post.<br /><div style="text-align: center;"><br /></div><div style="text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="410" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/8Iu405u7ZsE" width="500"></iframe> </div><br />Want a pretzel? Have a pretzel. Want cheese dipping sauce with your nachos...go ahead (though forgive me if I don't - plastic orange goo isn't that appealing even in it's correct environs). But designing a pizza using these ingredients just doesn't work for me. If it was experimental then fine...but don't release it and ask people to pay for it. I wonder if I'm alone in this or whether sales prove otherwise?<br /><br />There are clear parallels to mapping. Start with any old basemap - probably a default topographic one because you don't know what the others are for or, even better, use a satellite image because that's colourful and detailed and more must be better. Then slop some data over the top. Don't pay much attention to symbol choice or design...just dump your data across the top and smear it around. Actually, make it bright because it won't show up on the satellite basemap unless it's bright. Then if you have some point based ingredients (e.g. emoji...see <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/09/on-emoji-cartography.html" target="_blank">previous post</a>), position these across the top. Finish off with a smear of butter and a good dose of flavour enhancing salt and boom - you made a pretzel crust map.<br /><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/09/pretzel-crust-cartography.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-46999758829369886Tue, 30 Sep 2014 16:08:00 +00002014-09-30T11:19:28.037-07:00cartographycartojunkdesignsymbolsOn emoji cartographyThinking of putting emoji on a map? Please don't<br /><br />Whatever you call them: pictograms, pictorial markers and mimetic markers have always been hugely important in cartography. Well designed graphics that are used to represent a point of interest are fundamental to topographic mapping in particular but have become vital for web maps that show points of interest across a basemap. They should be clear, unambiguous and allow us to efficiently communicate the feature with simple graphic clarity. They should work in harmony with the rest of the map and subtlety often leads to a well balanced overall map.<br /><br />They're not easy to design though. You're often working with a very restricted size, perhaps pixel count and, ordinarily, a single colour. With all those constraints it's often difficult to imbue symbols with the meaning required if the intent is to support a map reader's ability to understand the feature without constant recourse to the map legend. This reason alone is why it's more common to use pre-defined symbols delivered as part of your software or available online. There are perfectly good repositories for symbols (e.g.&nbsp;<a href="http://symbolstore.org/" target="_blank">Symbol Store</a>, <a href="https://www.mapbox.com/maki/" target="_blank">Maki</a>) but what about emoji?<br /><br />Emoji - the Japanese pictographs which have become standard in electronic messaging. They're increasingly used as shorthand for all sorts of communication.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hYAuuQgE7Gk/VCrQNaXMkQI/AAAAAAAAA40/QJp459FkPSw/s1600/Emoji.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-hYAuuQgE7Gk/VCrQNaXMkQI/AAAAAAAAA40/QJp459FkPSw/s1600/Emoji.jpg" height="266" width="400" /></a></div><br />Their increased use doesn't, however, mean they are well suited to being placed on a map. Take a look at this map, made by Katy DeCorah (click to view the live map as part of Katy's blog).<br /><a href="https://www.mapbox.com/blog/emoji-map-markers/" target="_blank"><br /></a><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><a href="https://www.mapbox.com/blog/emoji-map-markers/" target="_blank"><img alt="https://www.mapbox.com/blog/emoji-map-markers/" border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-tYHBqxeCDmU/VCrQNczwGWI/AAAAAAAAA4s/RT8lNTwtft8/s1600/emojimap.png" height="315" width="400" /></a></span></div><br />Katy's <a href="https://www.mapbox.com/blog/emoji-map-markers/" target="_blank">blog entry</a> explains she was interested in exploring a technical challenge, and she succeeded. But what of the outcome? Once the technical challenge had been achieved we still need to consider whether it's useful in a cartographic sense and in this case I'd suggest it isn't though Katy did at least use a limited set of POIs and did a good job of picking an emoji that vaguely represents the feature being mapped.<br /><br />In general terms these sort of symbols create disharmony. The emoji are too detailed, too colourful and too 'cartoony'. They inevitably clash with the background map and where they begin to coalesce (as they will in a multi-scale environment) they become impossible to decipher. Their style doesn't suit most cartographic work unless you have a very specific mapping project...perhaps a large scale children's atlas. They simply don't look good on a map. For balance...there are other cartoony symbols that I'd also vehemently discourage in cartographic terms. Such as:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4P4bSfhURX0/VCrQNX6UlQI/AAAAAAAAA4o/m0l8LZLDKSM/s1600/arcemoji.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-4P4bSfhURX0/VCrQNX6UlQI/AAAAAAAAA4o/m0l8LZLDKSM/s1600/arcemoji.png" height="274" width="320" /></a></div><br />One of the tenets of the cartographic design philosophy that I was taught was to keep things simple. The KISS principle (Keep It Simple Stupid) holds true for 99% of cartographic tasks. The best advice any budding cartographer can heed is to learn how to be comfortable omitting detail in terms of the overall map and also the individual elements. Creating clean, simple lines leads to a much more harmonious map and one that is, crucially, much easier to disantangle and read. Symbol design goes a long way to creating that harmony. Just because a set of symbols is technically capable of being put on a map doesn't mean they should be.<br /><br />Slopping emoji (or other 3D style, multi-coloured, shaded pictorial symbols) all over your map just doesn't work. Use them in your social messaging where a single emoji is often added as an exclamation or to characterise an emotion. Please don't use them en masse on a map...it hurts the eyes and as Kirsten Dunst might say, it's just a piece of poo (ht Craig Williams).<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bYMjiEUTTYQ/VCrzr-fy8bI/AAAAAAAAA5I/E9pC7TkGmt0/s1600/pizzapoo.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-bYMjiEUTTYQ/VCrzr-fy8bI/AAAAAAAAA5I/E9pC7TkGmt0/s1600/pizzapoo.png" height="116" width="320" /></a></div><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/09/on-emoji-cartography.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-6988902052044740731Wed, 17 Sep 2014 18:14:00 +00002014-09-21T10:43:40.655-07:00cartographyconferenceFOSS4GOld is new again (and again)Cartography has always reinvented itself. This is partly as new technology matures and we're able to do things faster, better and more easily than before. We tend to experiment on tried and tested techniques to replicate them as a means of testing. Technology catches up and a map is released on the world who mostly won't have seen it before... but which can have the unintended consequence of appearing to reinvent or, worse, plagiarising to those that have. Is this a problem?<br /><div><br /></div><div>Unfortunately I was unable to attend the 2014 FOSS4G conference in Portland this year. I thoroughly enjoyed being part of the 2013 event in Nottingham, UK where I helped organise and curate the Map Gallery. I was therefore very interested in seeing how the maps have developed for the 2014 event though I had to sadly decline an invitation to help out with the judging! The entries and results can be seen <a href="https://2014.foss4g.org/map-gallery/" target="_blank">here</a>.</div><div><br /></div><div>There were the usual mix of mashups and people simply entering re-styled Openstreetmap data. The former seems to be continuing to mature as we're moving beyond push-pinology. The latter, for me at least, is getting rather tedious. It's great that there are many tools out there that allow people to re-style basic topographic map data but that only sustains cartography for a limited time. It's painting by numbers, literally...and cartography is far more than that. It's what you do with your map and how you integrate the base mapping meaningfuly with your own or other data where something interesting happens. That leads to a third class of map...the ones that don't pour themselves into a template or use too much third party data or tools. It's in this space that we're seeing quite a bit of invention (and reinvention) as people make use of new browser capabilities or their ability to customise through code.</div><div><br /></div><div>I was therefore delighted to see my good friend and colleague <a href="http://cartography.oregonstate.edu/BernieJenny.html" target="_blank">Bernie Jenny</a> collect a couple of awards for the Plan Oblique Relief Shading work he's been doing with Jonas Buddeberg and Johannes Liem. Bernie's been doing fantastic things in cartography for a number of years. His <a href="http://www.reliefshading.com/" target="_blank">relief shading</a> web site and his many <a href="http://cartography.oregonstate.edu/software.html" target="_blank">software tools</a>&nbsp;show off some of the products of his research into the cartographic representation of terrain. I particularly like his <a href="http://www.terraincartography.com/terrainbender/" target="_blank">Terrain Bender</a> tools and his <a href="http://cartography.oregonstate.edu/demos/AdaptiveCompositeMapProjections/" target="_blank">Adaptive Composite Map Projections </a>work.</div><div><br /></div><div>The Plan Oblique Relief web app is terrific. He and his colleagues have built a new, interactive app that allows you to play with the variables to see how the technique gets modified for European relief. Inclination, hypsometrical tints, hill-shading zenith and azimuth as well as map rotation are all supported. I'm going to assume the awards were for this innovation though there's a part of me who wonders how many of the FOSS4G attendees had seen plan oblique before? We'll never know that...but Bernie's new work, with new technology brings to life a technique that can be traced back to Xaver Imfeld's work in 1887.</div><div><br /></div><div>Here's Bernie's map (click it to go to the app itself):</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://cartography.oregonstate.edu/tiles/PlanObliqueEurope/" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ir3VhdPCzPQ/VBnMX7Qw1uI/AAAAAAAAA30/cQrTEfndVaU/s1600/planoblique.png" height="480" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br /><div>And here's Imfeld's work:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-A8TXlez_O4E/VBnMsJqNWnI/AAAAAAAAA4E/x7lcKvPvpHw/s1600/MapCarte182_imfeld_large.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-A8TXlez_O4E/VBnMsJqNWnI/AAAAAAAAA4E/x7lcKvPvpHw/s1600/MapCarte182_imfeld_large.png" height="450" width="640" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>The technique has also been used extensively by Roger Smith in his fantastic maps of New Zealand:</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-B8d1NjEsg5M/VBnNoPX_70I/AAAAAAAAA4Q/onmDdstUxBA/s1600/planoblique2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-B8d1NjEsg5M/VBnNoPX_70I/AAAAAAAAA4Q/onmDdstUxBA/s1600/planoblique2.png" height="498" width="640" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div><br /></div><div>Both Bernie and Roger have been totally open about the lineage of their work. They don't claim the technique but they've taken it and developed something new and interesting because new technology allows them to do so. This is great for cartography but...</div><div><br /></div><div>I would like to see more people do their due diligence and both reflect on the lineage of their own work and be clear about their inspirations. I see far too many map-makers try and pass off their work as 'new' when in fact you don't have to dig too far to see that someone else has gone before. Imitation is, of course, the sincerest form of flattery and I have no issue whatsoever with people building on the work of others...but that's the point. Your work should build upon something and be clear about its heritage.</div><div><br /></div><div>Old is always new again in cartography. Perhaps we just need to be a little more honest in appreciating that fact rather than trying to leapfrog the past and hoping our map-readers know no better. I've been caught out by this before and I claim to know a little about maps. It is incumbent on us all to not try and dupe our map readers because they will have less reason to question authenticity and lineage. Bernie and his like are excellent role models for how we should portray and communicate our work.<br /><br />As a postscript I've been trying to engineer a plan oblique technique in my day job with ArcGIS. No luck yet but I'll crack on.</div><div><div></div></div>http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/09/old-is-new-again-and-again.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-376090554278078598Tue, 19 Aug 2014 01:50:00 +00002014-08-18T18:50:42.636-07:00cartographymiscellaneousJust an A<a href="https://twitter.com/albertocairo" target="_blank">Alberto Cairo</a>'s great blog post on the issue of <a href="http://www.thefunctionalart.com/2014/08/some-words-about-constructive-criticism.html" target="_blank">constructive criticism</a> and snark (as in snide remarks) turned into an interesting discussion with some really good contributions. Muggins waded in because I was mentioned in the original post and thought I had some comments to share...including a throwaway line about my first map getting an A+ at University.<br /><br />And my, didn't the inevitable people enjoy that nugget and wade in with some snark of their own. Curious that because they're the very same people who purport to hate anyone throwing snark in their direction.<br /><br />Anyway, I've got to hold my hand up...it wasn't an A+ I got, I dug out the work and dammit...just an A. So just for your enjoyment here's the cover of my very first map from University in 1989.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZtnXxk9N3rc/U_KnsB9-NGI/AAAAAAAAA2s/ptIzYKys8Qc/s1600/monsters4.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ZtnXxk9N3rc/U_KnsB9-NGI/AAAAAAAAA2s/ptIzYKys8Qc/s1600/monsters4.jpg" height="400" width="300" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">It was an A5 brochure designed to support the Monsters of Rock concerts at Castle Donington near my home town. When opened you got the layout of the concert site and all the important information...such as 'bar' being the first legend item:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-JcKPz1Vr470/U_KnqTYnmMI/AAAAAAAAA2Y/mZp2VQT6xbg/s1600/monsters3.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-JcKPz1Vr470/U_KnqTYnmMI/AAAAAAAAA2Y/mZp2VQT6xbg/s1600/monsters3.jpg" height="480" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The copy I have is getting a little tired and the ink has smudged but the map is still fairly legible. All hand drawn on drawing film with computer generated lettering positioned by hand, symbol design, drawing pen on film etc etc. Lots of work went into this little map.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The back cover had smaller scale location maps:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hQCn3YORf_w/U_KnqWjJUBI/AAAAAAAAA2c/2wco3JZsDA0/s1600/monsters2.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-hQCn3YORf_w/U_KnqWjJUBI/AAAAAAAAA2c/2wco3JZsDA0/s1600/monsters2.jpg" height="640" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And here's my lecturer's grade and feedback of which I remain very proud. His name was Roger Anson...a damn fine man and a brilliant lecturer. I was privileged to have learnt cartography from him and his colleagues Mike Childs, Stuart Granshaw and John Robertson.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ckt6i9zuFZQ/U_KnssR4-BI/AAAAAAAAA20/Acbnve-vvx8/s1600/monsters5.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-ckt6i9zuFZQ/U_KnssR4-BI/AAAAAAAAA20/Acbnve-vvx8/s1600/monsters5.jpg" height="640" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I've always been particularly proud of his last statement. I always have been someone who tries and helps people do better work. It's why I eventually went into academia and enjoyed helping my own students aspire to be better and to achieve their own goals. It's why I moved to work in the U.S. to help the company I work for make better products to help people make better maps. It's why I take a full and active part in the community with this somewhat snarky blog and a whole load of other far more sensible and unsnarky work.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">I also dug this gem out too...not one of my better pieces but I think it was piece of work set to try and create equal looking qualitative shading schemes on an early Mac using just lines. Tough project. Terrible map (by today's standards?)</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8PfIgdWq1MM/U_KnrCd-LZI/AAAAAAAAA2k/yxXm4qOvW_I/s1600/monsters1.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-8PfIgdWq1MM/U_KnrCd-LZI/AAAAAAAAA2k/yxXm4qOvW_I/s1600/monsters1.jpg" height="640" width="480" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">So there you have it friends...or if you're not a friend and just someone who thinks they know me through my tweets and this blog then maybe we'll get a chance to meet one day and share some constructive ideas.</div><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/08/just-a.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-2936520611366925966Sun, 17 Aug 2014 23:37:00 +00002014-08-17T19:07:36.240-07:00lyricmapLyricMap: Born in the U.S.A.<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Number 3 in an occasional series of LyricMaps is loosely based on Bruce Springsteen's Born in the U.S.A.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-oeOIu7zRdWo/U_Ff1_whSgI/AAAAAAAAA2I/vXUkDMizRjY/s1600/lyricmap_bornintheusa.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-oeOIu7zRdWo/U_Ff1_whSgI/AAAAAAAAA2I/vXUkDMizRjY/s1600/lyricmap_bornintheusa.png" height="640" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><span lang="EN-US">A hot spot analysis (using&nbsp;</span><span style="background-color: white; line-height: 18.4320011138916px;">Getis-Ord Gi*)&nbsp;</span>in GIS defines statistically significant neighbouring areas that are above or below the global average. Stronger red hot spots define neighbouring areas that have either more or less people born in the U.S.A., compared to the national average. More red (a hot spot) equates to more people born in the U.S.A. and more blue (a cold spot) equates to more people not born in the U.S.A based on data from the 2010 census. Areas shaded in neither blue or red have no statistically significant populations born in the U.S.A. or not so they are similar to the national average.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">The counties in New Jersey, Bruce Springsteen’s home state, are all cold spots with more people not born in the U.S.A. unlike Bruce.</span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></span></div><div class="MsoNormal" style="margin-bottom: 0.0001pt;"><span lang="EN-US"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Data analysis by Madeleine Parker and Linda Beale. Map by Kenneth Field&nbsp;</span></span></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/08/lyricmap-born-in-usa.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)14tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-4957868295910147320Sun, 17 Aug 2014 21:17:00 +00002014-08-17T14:17:00.277-07:00cartographydesignmiscellaneousthematicwebmapVoronoi treemap mapsThe New York Times flexed their considerable graphic muscles this week with some superb interactive charts showing how the population composition of U.S. States has changed over time. You can check them out <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/08/13/upshot/where-people-in-each-state-were-born.html?rref=upshot&amp;abt=0002&amp;abg=1" target="_blank">here</a>.<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2014/08/13/upshot/where-people-in-each-state-were-born.html?rref=upshot&amp;abt=0002&amp;abg=1" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-YO6u-uRhTAE/U_EZU2qSy3I/AAAAAAAAA1I/xDYUQnN96CM/s1600/nyt1.png" height="396" width="640" /></a></div><br />They really are beautiful graphs. Simple, clean, lots of 'white space', good hierarchy of typeography and excellent use of colour linking to a small map legend. They even provide some additional discussion and as you hover over the graph the intersection between time period and place gives you some basic metrics.<br /><br />They then added to this excellent set of graphs with an <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/16/upshot/mapping-migration-in-the-united-states-since-1900.html?abt=0002&amp;abg=1" target="_blank">interactive map</a> of the same data; a new kind of map that they're calling a <i>voronoi treemap map.</i><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/16/upshot/mapping-migration-in-the-united-states-since-1900.html?abt=0002&amp;abg=1" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/--iIxgPTBr0I/U_EZU-5HpPI/AAAAAAAAA1M/vFQmBglyfzM/s1600/nyt2.png" height="468" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br />The data has been pivoted so the focus is on space in contrast to the focus being predominantly on time in the graphical representation. You can pick one of three time slices to explore how patterns vary spatially. The hovers still work extremely well and one click zooms to a state...great user interaction and experience. The benefits of looking at a map instead of the graph are that it <i>should</i> support the visual comparison from place to place. That's not something you can do with the graphs with each one only illustrating a single state...but what about the map?<br /><br />What fascinated me about the map is the technique. The use of voronoi polygons to sub-divide space into a tesselation of shapes that represent different proportions is nothing new. Treemaps are also nothing new and have been used very successfully as a sort of area-based cartogram. Here, though, NYT have combined the techniques and used a bounding space (each State) inside of which space is tesselated based on the proportion of the population from different other places. It's not something I've seen before and it's always worth looking at experimental cartography.<br /><br />Does it work?<br /><br />I like the idea and I like the attempt at trying something new. However, I see two issues that I feel undermine the map and what it offers.<br /><br />Firstly, the voronoi polygons are only proportional intra-state and not inter-state so you get polygons with the same percentages of populus that are visually quite different to polygons with the same value in another state (see Texas compared to Oklahoma state-born residents, both 61% but one visually dominates). The point about putting anything on a map is to create visual comparisons and the voronois are, effectively, unequal in area from state-to-state so incomparable visually. The relative areas of each state underpin what we see. Since we're visually comparing one place to another and forming a mental picture at first glance Texas would seem to have a larger number of State-born residents than Oklahoma. I'm not sure there's an easy solution unless you turn the voronois into a population-equalizing cartogram (e.g. the Gastner Newman) to account for the different sized areas. It'd certainly be interesting to see what happens if they were equalised by population or area.<br /><br />My second observation is really just about the design and layout. In each state the surrounding voronoi fragments seem to be randomly positioned around the central voronoi polygon that represents the people born in-state. If you look at the small legend map on the graph version you see that the orange, green, blue and pink colours are used to suggest west, south-west, north and north-east. It would have been nice if the surrounding voronois were arranged so they sit on a compass direction to where the state actually exists. So for each state the oranges would always be on the left, the blues to the north etc. This may bring some sense of structure to the map and avoid the somewhat random positioning we currently see.<br /><br />Overall I think there's a lot of merit in this <i>new</i> map technique but it probably needs some more thinking to make it really useful.<br /><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/08/voronoi-treemap-maps.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-3623239610453963373Thu, 14 Aug 2014 17:40:00 +00002014-08-15T09:04:38.060-07:00cartographymapreviewtuitionwebmapWeb Mercator and Comparisons II[this post has been updated]<br /><br />Not a week has gone by since I posted about the problems of <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/08/web-mercator-and-comparisons.html" target="_blank">comparing areas between places using Web Mercator</a>. Here's a 'simple map' (author's phrase) that allows you to compare Gaza with other places on the globe. The interactive version is <a href="http://www.ahmadnassri.com/labs/gaza-everywhere/" target="_blank">here</a>&nbsp;[map now corrected].<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://www.ahmadnassri.com/labs/gaza-everywhere/" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-D0lAr82IbLM/U-zxfvvAztI/AAAAAAAAA04/8ZG1NWNGT8A/s1600/gaza1.png" height="464" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Terrific idea...take the outline of Gaza and allow people to enter a place they are familiar with in order to better understand the size of the place in comparison with somewhere they know.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Except the basemap is Google's Web Mercator (other Web Mercator basemaps do exist) and the shape has been drawn across the map.&nbsp;</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>Only places directly on the equator contain no areal distortion on Web Mercator. Gaza lies at approximately 30 degrees North so there's already considerable distortion in the area of Gaza on Web Mercator.<br /><br />If you then pan and zoom the map, the Gaza shape remains the same size and shape (at each scale) wherever you go to on the globe. It does not get reprojected as you move across the map and that's a huge cartofail fail regardless of the projection. As we saw in my previous post by looking at Tissot's Indicatrix the size of areas gets massively distorted across Web Mercator. The shape of Gaza would be no different.<br /><br />Unfortunately this is not accounted for in this map. A classic case of ignoring the impact of map projections. Unless you compare Gaza with somewhere else that is exactly 30 degrees North (or South) then you're comparing one distortion with another and the relative scales of the overlay graphic and the basemap are out of sync with one another. The map, then, is utterly useless and, worse, people look at it and believe that it accurately portrays the stated aim. It doesn't.<br /><br />A lot of people say to me that the science of cartography has little relevance anymore and it's all about form over function, or function over form and that rapid hackups that buck cartographic convention are healthy. If those that (a) build this sort of cartofail and (b) those that unwittingly consume it are happy then there's no hope. Unfortunately experience shows people tend to be happy in their ignorance and prefer their own facts over fact itself. If you make maps, learn some basics...it's really not that difficult but no amount of clever coding allows you to ignore the basic science of the very thing you're coding. Use your coding skills wisely and learn some domain knowledge to give those skills real power and substance.<br /><br />ht to <a href="https://twitter.com/rmcooper4" target="_blank">Ryan Cooper</a> for alerting me to this map and for correctly identifying the problem.<br /><br />UPDATE: Something unexpected happened after <a href="https://twitter.com/rmcooper4" target="_blank">Ryan Cooper</a>, <a href="https://twitter.com/rastrau" target="_blank">Ralph Straumann</a> and I tweeted and blogged about the problems of this map. The author <a href="https://twitter.com/ahmadnassri" target="_blank">Ahmad Nassri</a> got in touch. I was primed for the usual volley of abuse but unlike the majority of people who seem to take offence at having a critique of their work plastered online pointing out major faults, Ahmad took the opposite view. An online conversation took place in which he was grateful for someone identifying a shortcoming and eager to learn of the cartographic 'problem', he sought help in figuring out a way to overcome it. His reaction was refreshing and a credit to his desire to get his work 'right'. Within a couple of hours he had figured out a way to control the shape of Gaza using the Google Maps API geodesic parameter so that it would draw geodesically as you pan and zoom around the globe. It doesn't get over the problems of Web Mercator but it does make his Gaza shape scaleable across the globe to work in sync with the projection. Both the map and the shape of Gaza are now distorted in the same way which is as much as can be hoped for if Web Mercator is the basemap. The map now does what it claims, it gives people the correct basis for visual comparison but most of all Ahmad illustrated a willingness to take on board our comments and correct his work. He should be hugely commended for his reaction. Win win!http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/08/web-mercator-and-comparisons-ii.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-4340757085226605111Sat, 09 Aug 2014 16:35:00 +00002014-08-12T08:49:12.479-07:00cartographydesignthematictuitionWeb Mercator and ComparisonsGetting the curved surface of the earth onto a flat map (paper or screen) requires a map projection. The reason so many projections exist is because there is no perfect projection and they all contain distortions which affect area, distance, shape or size...and distortions vary to different extents across the map.<br /><br />While for most people, the often complex mathematics of transforming locations to the map is beyond their expertise it's important to pay some attention to the choice of projection. Choosing an appropriate projection is vital to ensure that the inherent distortions don't wreck the very purpose of your map.<br /><br />Let's look at one example...say, for instance, you were wanting to create a map which allowed you to compare the areal extents of different cities across the world. You might want to see how one city compares to another in terms of the amount of green space, or the population density in urban areas. The one thing, the only thing, you need to get right is the choice of a projection that supports visual comparison. You need a projection that does not distort area...because area is the one property of the map that supports the cognitive process of visual comparison. Let's see this in action...<br /><br />We can see what happens to distortions when we overlay Tissot's Indicatrix on the curved surface of the earth. The Indicatrix is simply a grid of equally sized circles (on the globe) which are a very familiar shape which makes it easy for us to see what happens when it gets distorted through projection. When projected, the grid of circles of equal size, shape and area are distorted which gives us a clear indication of what happens to the real geography that gets projected at the same time.<br /><br />Tissot's Indicatrix on a globe:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CH3YrkeB_cA/U-ZB250qO_I/AAAAAAAAAzc/Wtu1JE07Hro/s1600/tissot.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-CH3YrkeB_cA/U-ZB250qO_I/AAAAAAAAAzc/Wtu1JE07Hro/s1600/tissot.png" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Here's what happens when we project to Web Mercator, the default for web maps:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-upVPNXHDOZ8/U-ZFuN-BfRI/AAAAAAAAAz0/FOXq1_NrJTw/s1600/tissotmercator.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-upVPNXHDOZ8/U-ZFuN-BfRI/AAAAAAAAAz0/FOXq1_NrJTw/s1600/tissotmercator.png" height="384" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Web Mercator preserves angles (which is why the circles retain their shape) but distorts size, and, fundamentally, area. It's great for navigation (its intended purpose) but dreadful for most other purposes.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Now let's compare the two cities marked on the map...Oslo and Singapore.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Oslo is at 60 degrees North. Singapore is pretty much on the Equator at 1 degree North. There's virtually 60 degrees of latitude between them and looking at the two Tissot Indicatrix circles they fall in you can see the distortions that Web Mercator creates in the size of area between the two places. If you examine the size of the two circles you find that the Indicatrix around Oslo is approximately 75% larger than the one around Singapore.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Let's have a look at the impact on a real map. The following maps are on Web Mercator and both at a scale of 1:250,000. Oslo on the left, Singapore on the right.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5afXDywwfk8/U-ZJ36zMHRI/AAAAAAAAA0A/QqsTPBxEtEA/s1600/mercator_comparison.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-5afXDywwfk8/U-ZJ36zMHRI/AAAAAAAAA0A/QqsTPBxEtEA/s1600/mercator_comparison.png" height="228" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Now let's look at exactly the same map but projected using a Cylindrical Equal Area projection. I've switched the standard parallel to 60 degrees North for the Oslo map just to ensure the shape isn't distorted compared to Singapore but areas are consistent between the two maps. Now compare Oslo with Singapore.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rc08Pz21GoQ/U-ZJ3919uHI/AAAAAAAAA0E/A0LWbNBlkW8/s1600/equalarea_comparison.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-rc08Pz21GoQ/U-ZJ3919uHI/AAAAAAAAA0E/A0LWbNBlkW8/s1600/equalarea_comparison.png" height="228" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Oslo is now shown at the correct areal extent and size compared to Singapore. The distortions you see in the size of text etc is simply because the map tiles used to display this were originally in Web Mercator...so the fact they are now reduced in area by about 75% actually results in the map looking like it's shrunk. It has! It also shows how much Web Mercator tiles are distorted in terms of area the further from the equator you go.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The answer...pick the right projection for the right job. You can go beyond Web Mercator on a web map so it's just a case of figuring out how to do it using your technology of choice. If you're going to be comparing areas either for city comparison or for thematics you really do need an equal area projection unless all of your cities sit on the same degree of latitude. If not, you're literally pulling the wool over the eyes of your map readers and they leave with a totally distorted impression of the themes mapped.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Next time you look at a map whose purpose is comparing places just pause to check the projection and then make your own decision whether you can trust what your eyes are telling you.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/08/web-mercator-and-comparisons.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-1998748755274099479Fri, 08 Aug 2014 17:17:00 +00002014-08-12T08:57:34.922-07:00cartographyeducationtuitionThree dee thematicsI've always been intrigued by the potential for 3D in thematic cartography but it is that much harder to get 'right' than 2D...and look at what a mess many get in when trying to make even the most basic of 2D maps.<br /><div><br /></div><div>We see the world in three dimensions because we were given two eyes and stereoscopic vision. That gives us depth perception. In making maps on a flat surface (paper/screen) to mimic how we see the world we have to go beyond our basic palette of visual variables and symbol encoding and play with additional variables. We have to make the eyes see the third dimension.</div><div><br /></div><div>The standard way of achieving that is to make the map in a perspective view...near things are closer to the eye than further away things. We can accentuate this by perhaps adding a sky in the background (to mimic a far off horizon) or add in haze to diminish objects further away in the same way as haze affects our view in reality. This generally works well for maps of the natural world....mountainscapes and street scenes for instance.</div><div><br /></div><div>But this approach doesn't apply equally for thematics because the principle objective is to create a consistent view to support comparisons across the map. The perspective view does not support that cognitive need.</div><div><br /></div><div>Take the following example in which the Obama/Romney 2012 percentage share of vote election results are shown using a diverging hue colour scheme. Increasingly blue = Obama, Increasingly red = Romney. purple = equal share.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-gHaBKWrpEm4/U-T_Q-ojZWI/AAAAAAAAAzM/egudrkveyVw/s1600/election3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-gHaBKWrpEm4/U-T_Q-ojZWI/AAAAAAAAAzM/egudrkveyVw/s1600/election3.png" height="442" width="640" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div><br /></div><div>What the map doesn't show us is how many voters there are in each county which might help us better understand the reason Obama won...so let's whip it into 3D and use extruded areas to show the number of voters.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-yB2JAqy09OU/U-T9qVey9_I/AAAAAAAAAzE/2-XFTTKBCsg/s1600/election1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-yB2JAqy09OU/U-T9qVey9_I/AAAAAAAAAzE/2-XFTTKBCsg/s1600/election1.png" height="386" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div>Simply placing the choropleth on a virtual globe and extruding areas is a very common approach to 3D thematic mapping but it's bloody awful!<br /><br />The perspective view seriously compromises our ability to compare the height of our extrusions like-for-like. The foreground is nearer the eye than the background. Worse, the curvature on a virtual globe alters the shapes as well so we're seeing all sorts of distortions that our brains have no hope of disentangling.&nbsp;The “fish eye lens” effect mean each prism is viewed from a different angle than its neighbors, making comparison just a little bit harder as we have to mentally account for these differences in our estimates. It's hard to judge the height of something when you are staring directly down at it too...look at those areas in Florida. This matters because height is the visual variable that does the “work” in this map—it’s how the data are encoded visually.<br /><br />Here are a couple of other examples that make the same mistake. First up, capacity by energy source in the US:<br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-quNEKsOMNYo/U-T9ThaPjKI/AAAAAAAAAy0/iOupnvgTreI/s1600/capacity.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-quNEKsOMNYo/U-T9ThaPjKI/AAAAAAAAAy0/iOupnvgTreI/s1600/capacity.png" height="354" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The map tells us (yes, it does...in the blurb at the top) that we're seeing a clear stratification of energy sources across the US. Are we? I just see a map whose visual centre is focused on the sparse areas in the middle (the least interesting datawise) and a load of 3D columns of various colours fading off and disappearing over the horizon. It's like the data is running away, off the edge of the map, scared to be party to the horrific map it's been placed on.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">In this example, 3D kills the map. The intent to 'look cool' by using a curved virtual globe destroys any hope of the reader being able to see any patterns. Look at the large orange bar in Arizona toward the front...is it taller or shorter than the one you see poking out above the skyline in the north-east? Who knows...but I bet they're about the same value. And stacking colours on top of one another makes the top colours more prominent anyway. Who knows what's hidden from view in the east. And finally, what of the colours...nearly 30 of them. The map reader has no hope of figuring out the difference between distillate fuel oil and petroleum gas...or geothermal and purchased steam.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Another I saw recently appeared on a T-Mobile advert:</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0_D43NwJfPs/U-T9TF1zkrI/AAAAAAAAAys/UHIWpzvMjgs/s1600/tmobile.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-0_D43NwJfPs/U-T9TF1zkrI/AAAAAAAAAys/UHIWpzvMjgs/s1600/tmobile.jpg" height="440" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>&nbsp;The title is meaningless. The legend shows us T-Mobile's data network usage in the slightly darker pink among their partner networks in slightly lighter pink. OK - it's an advert. The point is to show complete nationwide coverage and they wanted something a little more visually striking than a choropleth so...threedee it! Except compacting the map by putting it on its side and tilting it so dramatically makes it impossible to see where all those columns actually sit. And what's the vertical scale? It seems that the base height is actually extruded a fair bit to give the impression that perhaps even a small usage/coverage is a little larger than it might actually be. The map is designed to obfuscate reality because it's an advert...but if we wanted to make sense of the actual distribution the 3D approach kills it.<br /><br />And here's an example from Andrew Hill which you really have to see as the <a href="http://bl.ocks.org/andrewxhill/raw/03d5efc9d132d4aaa6bd/" target="_blank">web map here</a> to fully appreciate its full three dee gory glory:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ugxt1v475_Y/U-o4DpElQXI/AAAAAAAAA0c/V9oXe3Sz7nQ/s1600/hill3D.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ugxt1v475_Y/U-o4DpElQXI/AAAAAAAAA0c/V9oXe3Sz7nQ/s1600/hill3D.png" height="414" width="640" /></a></div><br />Andrew does some great work and pushes what technology allows. He also brings a fresh perspective on making maps that pushes the boundaries and challenges long-held principles. That's great in many ways but there also has to be a sense of understanding when the outcome doesn't stack up cognitively.<br /><br />The hexagons have been used to bin the point data (911 calls) and height of the prism relates to quantity. All well and good to this point...but try and compare height relative to an absolute vale or relative to one another and you quickly become disoriented. Technically this is cool, no doubt. Cartographically it's questionable...very questionable, because it doesn't support the necessary cognitive processing needed to understand the pattern.<br /><br />I did enjoy his twitter banter though...<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6vrg1F9tk9Q/U-o5NTYL0II/AAAAAAAAA0o/WWZK24S14xg/s1600/Hill3Dtweet.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-6vrg1F9tk9Q/U-o5NTYL0II/AAAAAAAAA0o/WWZK24S14xg/s1600/Hill3Dtweet.png" /></a></div><br /><br />So can we make better 3D thematic maps? Yes. You simply need to use an isometric projection which distorts the plane on which your map sits to make the scale equivalent across the whole map. Here's the election data on an isometric base:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_BO_dFucjjE/U-T9pkxB1vI/AAAAAAAAAy8/mc8-ewPJxto/s1600/election2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-_BO_dFucjjE/U-T9pkxB1vI/AAAAAAAAAy8/mc8-ewPJxto/s1600/election2.png" height="434" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div>Now unless you're going to provide the ability to rotate and interact with the map, you're going to still suffer the problems of occluded data but at least here each column is in the correct relative proportion to one another. We can accurately compare heights across the map and make sensible inferences. The interactive version is <a href="http://www.arcgis.com/apps/CEWebViewer/viewer.html?3dWebScene=f034d08dbde649fe97ed2f3ec5bbf381" target="_blank">here</a> which supports rotate, pan and zoom...though be warned that another difficulty with interactive maps is the constant ability to rotate, pan and zoom means we lose track of our visual anchors and this generates short-term memory flushing. In other words...you easily forget what you just saw and that means you lose the ability to build a comparative picture.<br /><br /><iframe allowfullscreen="true" frameborder="0" height="400" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0" scrolling="no" src="http://www.arcgis.com/apps/CEWebViewer/viewer.html?&amp;3dWebScene=f034d08dbde649fe97ed2f3ec5bbf381&amp;view=-838400.13,1114,-1014610.46,172635242.64,182106131.1,256590853.86,0.02&amp;lyr=1,1,0,1,0,1,1&amp;wkid=4326&amp;v=2&amp;autoplay&amp;reducedUI" width="600"></iframe> <br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div>There we go...some thoughts on threedee thematics. In short...stick to 2D unless you're prepared to go the extra distance to deal with the additional problems 3D creates.</div>http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/08/three-dee-thematics.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-7983521474936433699Fri, 08 Aug 2014 15:55:00 +00002014-08-17T11:44:03.426-07:00cartofaileducationthematicThe reason for cartographyIf ever there existed a reason for cartography then this is it. Possibly the year's worst map so far. <br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Lmvlk3IyM1c/U-Tu2fRU_wI/AAAAAAAAAyI/21rvDSgECRY/s1600/chorofail_aug.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-Lmvlk3IyM1c/U-Tu2fRU_wI/AAAAAAAAAyI/21rvDSgECRY/s1600/chorofail_aug.png" height="344" width="640" /></a></div><br />It was on the New Republic&nbsp;<a href="http://www.newrepublic.com/article/119011/map-how-much-24-states-lost-refusing-expand-medicaid" target="_blank">web site</a>&nbsp;today as a map to accompany a story by <a href="https://twitter.com/citizencohn" target="_blank">Jonathan Cohn</a>.<br /><br />There is nothing about the map that is correct...actually, that's a lie...the projection (Albers equal area) is correct. The data, however needs to be classified, it needs to be normalised and it needs a sensible, sequential colour scheme.<br /><br />To be fair to the guy he's taken some serious social media heat and redrawn the map. The data is now classified and he's got a decent shading scheme. Still not normalised though...so it's impossible to make any sensible visual comparisons.<br /><br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-pct0FYFlSIg/U-Tvh_i3gOI/AAAAAAAAAyQ/1f14YbDdtQA/s1600/chorofail2_aug.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-pct0FYFlSIg/U-Tvh_i3gOI/AAAAAAAAAyQ/1f14YbDdtQA/s1600/chorofail2_aug.png" height="352" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Is the availability of tools to allow anyone to make maps a good thing. Yes...as long as those same people appreciate that if they are going to do so they are obliged to learn how to avoid the basic mistakes as a bare minimum. Cartography exists to guide people. Yes, there are basic cartographic rules but they are designed to tell map-makers how people read maps and, therefore, how to design them to make sense and be useful. If you're going to make a map of your data, ignore cartography at your peril.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">And as I type...<a href="https://twitter.com/skoczela" target="_blank">Steve Koczela</a> has re-worked the data into per capita so here is a 'correctly constructed' map. Good projection...classified sensibly, decent shading scheme...and normalised data so we can compare like-for-like across the map. All rise!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-7B35nbK4-Dg/U-TyHx0ASSI/AAAAAAAAAyY/N8BxplSZLzA/s1600/chorofail3_aug.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-7B35nbK4-Dg/U-TyHx0ASSI/AAAAAAAAAyY/N8BxplSZLzA/s1600/chorofail3_aug.png" height="416" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">So there you go...the first map shouted Pennsylvania and Alaska (bright colour catches the eye). The second map told me Texas and Florida were screwed (darker colours = more). The final map...Mississippi by some margin from North Carolina. Texas isn't that bad after all.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Finally...a small parting shot...with about half the states missing data...maybe this would look far better as a bar graph anyway?</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TxiHgrGwc1I/U-T1lWS-qhI/AAAAAAAAAyg/OUEm3VHe5a8/s1600/chorofail4_aug.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-TxiHgrGwc1I/U-T1lWS-qhI/AAAAAAAAAyg/OUEm3VHe5a8/s1600/chorofail4_aug.png" height="242" width="400" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">UPDATE: Cohn has updated his web page to include a per capita map. As this blog is set up entirely to point out cartographic mistakes (often with a little of my cursed British humour thrown in which I know isn't to everyone's taste) it's a welcome sight to see people respond and correct their efforts where necessary. I admire Cohn for taking the views of this commentator, along with many others, into account and correcting his mistakes. It's encouraging that some actually do want to learn and move forward with their work. There's also a nice write-up of the need for constructive critisism spurred on by this map over on <a href="http://www.thefunctionalart.com/2014/08/some-words-about-constructive-criticism.html" target="_blank">Alberto Cairo's excellent blog</a>.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/08/the-reason-for-cartography.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-2179018841005129840Fri, 13 Jun 2014 16:08:00 +00002014-06-13T09:41:56.855-07:00cartographymiscellaneousPedantic cartographyAs regular readers know, this entire blog is set up to fight the fight against cartofails. It's written in a jocular style with my British sense of dry humour. I was born with it. It's just the way we're built. Where I can I provide clarification on why a particular map fails and how it can be improved. Occasionally I even re-work stuff to show a 'better' alternative. Remember, this blog began with my correction of the True Size of Africa cartofail by Kai Krausse and my <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2011/09/welcome-to-marauding-carto-nerd.html" target="_blank">very first blog post</a>.<br /><br />I recently did a <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/i-would-map-500-miles.html" target="_blank">reworking</a> to show where The Proclaimers may have reached in 500 miles. Over the last few weeks it's picked up quite a head of steam and been featured in <a href="http://slate.me/1lMnPUR">Slate</a>, The Atlantic's <a href="http://bit.ly/1s2XqK1" target="_blank">Citylab</a>, got to Number 1 on the Reddit <a href="https://pay.reddit.com/r/MapPorn/comments/27p5ot/where_did_the_proclaimers_walk_to_640x655/" target="_blank">Mapporn</a> sub-Reddit and even warranted a <a href="https://twitter.com/Amazing_Maps/status/476824244589170688/photo/1" target="_blank">post</a> by that most nonsensical Twitter account @Amazing_Maps. And today it again popped up in <a href="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/howaboutthat/10891632/Where-could-you-get-to-if-you-walked-500-miles-and-500-more.html" target="_blank">The Telegraph</a>...once a respected, though very right wing, British newspaper. All terribly prestigious coverage for what must rate as my most frivolous mapping project ever.<br /><br />This latest effort by <a href="https://twitter.com/JEdgarTweets" target="_blank">James Edgar</a> has me wincing and has my friends and colleagues chortling into their corn flakes. Edgar has reworked the story from a collage of other sites and it shows. I'm introduced as a pedantic cartographer. Yeah yeah, maybe that's true but why is it that virtually every cartographer get's labelled as pedantic, picky or awkward as if it's a fundamental flaw in our character? These labels stick and really don't help the cause. It's like every scientist has to be a boffin or, dare I say, every journalist is accused of lazy journalism. Actually yes...that's exactly the point. Lazy journalism.<br /><br />How does correcting a common mapping error by making the effort to show and explain the error with the intent of improving people's appreciation of maps become something to deride? Pedantry is an obsession with 'minor rules'. Sorry pal, but these minor rules actually become very important in mapping even if you neither care nor know about it.<br /><br />It's not about precision as Edgar suggests...I was not making a more precise map...I was making a correct map for the projection used (Web Mercator). Apparently I "created an accurate projection". No...I did no such thing, the projection already exists. What I did was map correctly on top of it. He goes on that I explained that "<span style="background-color: white; color: #282828; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20.719999313354492px;">simply drawing perfect circles around the start point on a flat world map would not offer a true indication of where they could get to". Actually I didn't say that. You can draw perfect circles on any flat map that uses a conformal projection. You cannot on Web Mercator (actually, strictly speaking you can...they just won't be perfect circles when projected back onto a spherical surface). It's a function of the mathematical projection, not the fact the map is flat. Apparently I then used a "clever computer tool called a Web Mercator". Seriously? Did you not even use Google to check Wikipedia to find out what Web Mercator actually is?</span><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #282828; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20.719999313354492px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #282828; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20.719999313354492px;">Comments are not enabled on Edgar's post so I have no right of reply. He didn't contact me before running the story so i cannot even claim I've been misquoted.</span><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #282828; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20.719999313354492px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #282828; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20.719999313354492px;">Let me finish off with some true pedantry. Edgar refers to me as Mr Field. It's actually Dr. Yeah, that's pedantic but heck...I have a qualification in my area of expertise.</span><br /><span style="background-color: white; color: #282828; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20.719999313354492px;"><br /></span><span style="background-color: white; color: #282828; font-family: arial, helvetica, sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 20.719999313354492px;">The Telegraph? Wow...more like the Daily Mail.</span><br /><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/06/pedantic-cartography.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-6248442640449139374Wed, 28 May 2014 19:02:00 +00002014-05-28T13:00:38.346-07:00cartographydesigneducationtuitionTesting..testing...1, 2, 3.I was reminded this week of a number of ways in which you can assess cartographic work in simple ways. A conversation between <a href="https://twitter.com/albertocairo" target="_blank">Alberto Cairo</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/moritz_stefaner" target="_blank">Moritz Stefaner</a> trod over some old ground but their conversation is worth exploring because much of what I see fails these simple tests (and leads to me blogging). They debated the first and second of the simple tests I set out below. I added the third. These are tests that I (and many others) apply when looking at and critiquing maps. They are the basic tests that anyone can apply:<br /><br /><b>So What?</b><br />The first test is simple...does the work you are looking at leave you asking <i>so what?</i>. This is how we used to assess student dissertation proposals and get them to reflect on whether their proposal was worth doing. Was it persuasive? Did it make me want to know more...to explore or find something out? Did it make me care? All maps ought to, at some level, inspire their intended audience to want to care about what it is that's being illustrated and the message of the map. It has to have a function and if the form is well crafted that function should be visible. The map may very well have a good purpose to the map-maker but has that been extended to an audience?<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nWa5oEerB8Y/U4Ys80CWugI/AAAAAAAAAws/YefbFUXPKc0/s1600/calvin.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-nWa5oEerB8Y/U4Ys80CWugI/AAAAAAAAAws/YefbFUXPKc0/s1600/calvin.jpg" height="203" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br />This isn't an exact science though. Different people and user groups have different <i>so what</i> thresholds and so what works for one may not necessarily work for another. This is where a consideration of the audience comes in when you are making a map. Engage your audience first. Bring along others if you can. Pleasing everyone all the time is impossible though.<br /><br />It's also perfectly reasonable to experiment and at the moment we're in a period of cartographic development where technology is out-pacing best practice. Animation and 3D are just two areas that we've always played with but now the tools are mature enough to allow people to really get their hands dirty...and they are. At the moment there's too many failing the <i>so what?</i> test. This may not be a bad thing IF it leads to new ways of working that make good use of the techniques.<br /><br /><b>Ah-ha!</b><br /><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mcV5W16RIPw/U4Yw0LdcDAI/AAAAAAAAAxA/2vnvfufoCkA/s1600/aha.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-mcV5W16RIPw/U4Yw0LdcDAI/AAAAAAAAAxA/2vnvfufoCkA/s1600/aha.jpg" height="151" width="200" /></a>Let's assume people have got past the <i>so what </i>moment because, let's face it, if they haven't then they've already clicked to another web page or left dissatisfied with your work. Upon inspection, does the map give you some sort of mini-eureka moment? Is the message communicated with clarity and has the map-maker made it legible? Clarity and legibility are key though they are not the same thing. Clarity relates to the message. Has the message been encoded into the map's syntax effectively. Legibility is the way in which the map-maker has brought focus to that message through effective graphical structure.<br /><br />Put simply...do you <i>get it? </i>This is the <i>ah-ha!</i> moment when you realise what it is you're supposed to learn or find out. It should come relatively easily.<br /><br />The person that reads your map should leave with a deeper understanding of the theme or topic. They shouldn't have to work too hard to gain that understanding either. The ability of the map-maker to make you care enough to want to look at the map and give you some sort of clarity about a topic is what good cartography is about.<br /><br /><b>The squint</b><br />Does the story of the map immediately jump out at you? Given we cannot rely on people spending that much time or effort viewing your map, making the message legible is crucial and this has a lot to do with your ability to structure your map. This is down to what British geographer William Balchin termed graphicacy. He coined the phrase in a 1972 address to the Geographical Association. Graphicacy is the natural counterpart to other cognitive intelligent processes of communication such as literacy, numeracy and articulacy. Maps and other spatial documents are the tools of graphicacy and the very basis of geography. Cartography is the professional application of expertise in graphicacy.<br /><br />Becoming proficient in graphicacy will help you tell your story more effectively in the same way that effective writing or speaking skills helps you communicate using the written or spoken word. If you know how to speak in a graphical language then you're half way to being able to communicate your message. This goes beyond knowing constructional techniques and mechanics for knowing how and when to use certain graph or map types though. It's just as much about how you organise them on the page or screen. While written and spoken language comes at us in serial...one word after another in a sequence that our eyes follow and our brain systematically decodes, pictures arrive at our eyes in parallel. Maps are presented all at once. So we need to encode them so that certain components appear more prominently to give our brains a chance at decoding into some sense of order. These lead the eye. they may be larger or more visually prominent, they may use lighter or desaturated or bolder or more saturated colour, they may appear in a certain animated sequence or they may require interaction but doing a squint test is a good way to determine whether what you are looking at is communicating well.<br /><br /><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0wARlOLMszo/U4Yriez1J1I/AAAAAAAAAwg/yGqwZ-28B8w/s1600/clint.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-0wARlOLMszo/U4Yriez1J1I/AAAAAAAAAwg/yGqwZ-28B8w/s1600/clint.png" /></a>So...sit back as if you're in a wild west film, chewing on a cheroot and pretending to be Clint Eastwood. then squint and look at the map. What do you see? If you can still make out the main features and the central topic of the map then chances are it's got its graphical structure well proportioned and balanced. It's a simple way of seeing whether what you are seeing is what your brain is receiving. If your eyes are picking out peripheral or less important components under this test then that's going to cloud the message. There is some science behind this...what you're doing when squinting is reducing the amount of light entering your eye. Your peripheral vision is also impacted. You therefore have lower levels of visual acuity (visual resolution) and so you are trying your hardest to pick out key shapes and features.<br /><br /><b>And finally...some words from a master</b><br />As with everything, there will always be examples that break the rules. there will always be innovation that overrides some of this so be mindful of that when looking at maps. Also, remember that the value of a map is going to vary between audiences so that will undoubtedly affect your impression. Then there's the final matter of subjectivity. While the above are semi-objective tests there's no doubt that we all have preferences for certain types of maps and particular looks and feel. Do you prefer Monet, Turner or Banksy? We all bring our subjective preferences to the table.<br /><br />In the week that the great designer <a href="http://www.vignelli.com/" target="_blank">Massimo Vignelli</a> died it's worth reflecting on some of his basic tenets in design and thoughts on why experts in a field are important in the context of shaping best practice. This gives context to the simple tests described above:<br /><br /><i>"I like design to be semantically correct, syntactically consistent, and pragmatically understandable. I like it to be visually powerful, intellectually elegant, and above all timeless."</i><br /><i><br /></i><i>"If you can design one thing, you can design everything."</i><br /><i><br /></i><i>"I thought that it might be useful to pass some of my professional knowledge around, with the hope of improving [young designers'] design skills. Creativity needs the support of knowledge to be able to perform at its best."</i><br /><i><br /></i><i>"If you do it right, it will last forever."</i><br /><i><br /></i><i>"The life of a designer is a life of fight against the ugliness."</i><br /><i><br /></i><i>"There is no design without discipline. There is no discipline without intelligence."</i><br /><i><br /></i><i>"Good design lasts longer."</i><br /><i><br /></i><i>"...and that is why I love Design."</i><br /><br />The three tests outlined here are basic things you can do to see if your own designs are working and to look at whether other designs are working. It's not rocket science but it may just help you to take a step back and reflect on the quality of the work. There's lots of fancy ways to make maps but fundamentally...are they working?http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/testingtesting1-2-3.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-5662164346459081126Sat, 24 May 2014 21:44:00 +00002014-06-02T13:12:13.098-07:00cartojunklyricmapmiscellaneousthematicLyricMap: Where the Streets Have No NameInspired by the nonsense mapping of <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/i-would-map-500-miles.html" target="_blank">The Proclaimers 500 miles</a>&nbsp;that I re-mapped,&nbsp;I was pondering a few other geographical lyrics and how they might be mapped. I'm going to call them <i>LyricMaps</i>&nbsp;™<i>&nbsp;</i>and there's a lot of them. First up -let's&nbsp;give U2's <i>Where the Streets Have No Name</i> a whirl and see what we come up with.<br /><br />First, start with a nice healthy dataset of all streets in the contiguous USA and use some Geographical Information Systems savvy to process it. I'm fortunate to have access to the 2012 version of the Tom Tom data for North America which contains over 15 million street segments.<br /><br />Second, apply a few of query analyses to extract any street segment without a name, discounting outliers like connectors, ramps, slip roads and such like. The result: a LyricMap of 3.5 million streets with no name, the beauty of which is that I don't need to worry about labelling because, well...there aren't any!<br /><br />Finally, map each road segment with a huge dose of transparency so at the final scale the map shows areas that contain relatively few streets with no name as dark as the background. Where there are numerous streets with no name, the overlapping transparent symbols create a much lighter effect.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FVQLCi52ilI/U4EQWpanPsI/AAAAAAAAAwQ/jcfDt9-p1jg/s1600/streetshavenoname_v1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-FVQLCi52ilI/U4EQWpanPsI/AAAAAAAAAwQ/jcfDt9-p1jg/s1600/streetshavenoname_v1.png" height="640" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The map deserved to be styled as an homage to U2's classic 1987 The Joshua Tree which contains the track.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">The overall pattern suggests that it's streets in rural areas that have no name. Pretty much all the major cities appear dark indicating a low number of streets with no name. This makes sense...the dataset contains every road in the U.S. and many of them would be dirt tracks. Despite there being over 3 million separate segments on this map there isn't much sense looking at the detail for a particular city...there are so few it makes the map sparse as the following larger scale map of California illustrates.</div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aCYqPktnVI4/U4zCe26CtPI/AAAAAAAAAxU/xe8GRcKB63g/s1600/cali_streets.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-aCYqPktnVI4/U4zCe26CtPI/AAAAAAAAAxU/xe8GRcKB63g/s1600/cali_streets.png" height="640" width="371" /></a></div><div><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">That said, if you want a giant 36 inch version at 300dpi then you can download one <a href="https://drive.google.com/file/d/0BwP7O8vRANkBMmMxN0JwRl84bjQ/edit?usp=sharing" target="_blank">here</a>. It's 12Mb.</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Of course, there's more work that could be done to eliminate more categories of roads but hey - this is just a bit of fun. I've got plenty more geographically inspired LyricMaps planned so stay tuned!</div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><br /></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;">Acknowledgments: Tom Tom data used and published under licence using Esri technology.</div>http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/lyricmap-where-streets-have-no-name.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)9tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-3737101555230963559Thu, 22 May 2014 02:59:00 +00002014-06-13T09:10:44.918-07:00cartojunkmiscellaneousthematictuitionI would map 500 milesWhen The Proclaimers released <i>Sunshine on Leith</i> in 1988 I was just about heading off to University (to study cartography and geography - that bit is important). They were not to my musical taste...why would I want to be beaten up for liking such a dreadful duo? Little did I know that over 25 years later I'd be making a map relating to one of their first and most celebrated ditties <i>I'm gonna be (500 miles)</i>. If you want the background read on...if you want to see my map, scroll to the bottom.<br /><br />The song is renowned for the lyric <i>But I would walk 500 miles. And I would walk 500 more...blah de blah blah....</i> And so fast forward to 2014 and the following popped up in my twitter stream.<br /><br /><blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">An attempt to answer <a href="https://twitter.com/DragonXVI">@DragonXVI</a>'s fundamental question - Where the hell were the proclaimers actually walking to? <a href="http://t.co/AYXs4IXTli">pic.twitter.com/AYXs4IXTli</a><br />— Hazel McKendrick (@HazelMcKendrick) <a href="https://twitter.com/HazelMcKendrick/statuses/468378367193255936">May 19, 2014</a></blockquote>Now it's clearly tongue in cheek and fair play to Hazel McKendrick...I haven't seen anyone tackle this cultural dilemma before and she had a good go. Where, indeed, were The Proclaimers going to walk 500 miles to from Leith? And what about the 500 more? Unfortunately she used two perfect circles at the nominated distance around Leith but too late, another viral map is born and all the usual suspects begin clamoring to heap praise upon it.<br /><br /><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ZwOVQSCHyqU/U31lopeobsI/AAAAAAAAAvw/xMaNlLWUDaQ/s1600/xkcd.png" imageanchor="1" style="clear: right; float: right; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-left: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-ZwOVQSCHyqU/U31lopeobsI/AAAAAAAAAvw/xMaNlLWUDaQ/s1600/xkcd.png" height="200" width="180" /></a>I and a number of map-minded people folded our arms and began finding fault because the circles shouldn't be so, well...circular! Yet again someone had done something wrong on the internet (thanks to <a href="https://twitter.com/geospacedman" target="_blank">Barry Rowlingson</a> for reminding me of the well observed <a href="http://www.xkcd.com/386/" target="_blank">XKCD cartoon</a>).<br /><br />Great idea. Nice bit of fun but...wait...the Web Mercator projection distorts shapes and areas pretty markedly. If you draw a line indicating 500 miles around Leith on that projection it would not be a circle.<br /><br />Here's the classic example from The Economist on the threat from North Korean missiles that made the same mistake...<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-48fonNW4z9U/U31bSr38GsI/AAAAAAAAAvc/t5ZzmGX0BA0/s1600/BoGc8-MCEAAWhQD.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-48fonNW4z9U/U31bSr38GsI/AAAAAAAAAvc/t5ZzmGX0BA0/s1600/BoGc8-MCEAAWhQD.jpg" height="341" width="400" /></a></div><br />And here's the correction they were forced to publish after they had redrawn the lines properly and with respect to the projection used for the map...<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1ednULTr57I/U31bSs7-R1I/AAAAAAAAAvg/evuxLHNMOpk/s1600/BoGdCT9CEAE02HR.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-1ednULTr57I/U31bSs7-R1I/AAAAAAAAAvg/evuxLHNMOpk/s1600/BoGdCT9CEAE02HR.jpg" height="345" width="400" /></a></div><br />Now it's questionable whether marking the range of North Korean missiles incorrectly is more or less dangerous than the lyrics from The Proclaimers (I guess it's a question of taste) but either way McKendrick's map is wrong. And then what about the fact that reaching Iceland would require them to walk on water? Now we're stretching the bounds of their talent just a little far with that one surely!<br /><br />So, as a self-respecting cartonerd I re-did the map...<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QbUB3MO2fTg/U34S7PC8lmI/AAAAAAAAAwA/V2W8X3lUYC4/s1600/proclaimers.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-QbUB3MO2fTg/U34S7PC8lmI/AAAAAAAAAwA/V2W8X3lUYC4/s1600/proclaimers.png" height="640" width="624" /></a></div><br /><br />I still used Web Mercator and placed 500 mile and 1000 mile geodesic buffers around Leith (using the same huge assumption as McKendrick) to show the real distances as they appear on this map. These represent the theoretical extent of how far they might walk so if they went off-road and walked in a straight line that's where they would end up (notwithstanding the small matter of the wet stuff).<br /><br />I also went a little further and used a bit on analytic acumen to calculate how far 500 miles would take them using the European road network. Then I calculated how far they could get by going 500 more. Those areas I show as shaded so we can see how far they would walk on land. I took some liberties...I presumed they only walked on roads and of course, they may know of sneaky short-cuts or go roaming cross-country. I also presumed the ferry journey's equated to a walking distance when they most likely sat down and had a rest (though if they walked round the deck then the eventual distances need reducing slightly)<br /><br />It's not perfect (there's no North Sea ferries to Scandinavia and the Brittany ferry is also missing) but it's better than shoving circles on a Web Mercator projection and calling it cartography. The correct version applies knowledge of how maps work to make a sensible, correct map...even though the theme is distinctly daft and I still hate the song with a passion. I hate poor cartography more though.<br /><br />That said, McKendrick's map has nearly 2,000 retweets at the time of writing. Mine? 88. Proof positive that actually nobody gives a shit about quality anymore...or when someone has gone to the effort of providing a correction they do their very best to ignore.<br /><br />Update: Thank you to all the people who have read this since posted. And a particular thank you to all the other nerds out there who have found fault with my version. I have updated the map to make the necessary corrections and disclaimers.<br /><br />Update 2: I couldn't resist...I did a <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/lyricmap-where-streets-have-no-name.html" target="_blank">Where the Streets Have No Name</a> follow-up map...and I'm now thinking of all the other geo-related maps that can be made. I'm calling them Lyric Maps.<br /><br />Update 3: Funny how frivolous work gets noticed...I've written an update in a new blog post called <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/06/pedantic-cartography.html" target="_blank">Pedantic cartography</a>.<br /><br /><br /><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script>http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/i-would-map-500-miles.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)13tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-1962500283140437288Mon, 19 May 2014 19:18:00 +00002014-05-28T08:51:17.469-07:00cartofailcartographycartojunkdesignSpreading Light, Wasting LightThis blog entry is about mapping, honestly...but to get to my point I'll start with Dave Grohl and then get to Robert Downey Jr and Steven Feldman...bear with me.<br /><br />On a recent flight I watched (for the second time) the great documentary on Sound City studios by Dave Grohl. The iconic music recording studio in Los Angeles was one of only a very few in the world to house a custom Neve 8028 24-track recording console designed by Rupert Neve. It was a hand-wired analog device which acted as the interface between the musician and the tape used to record the music but it was the console that gave the end product such a rich, unique sound. Often, musicians would need to play their track over 150 times to get it as they wanted it with all the imperfections ending up on the tape. They not only had to master their trade but be dedicated to giving their best live performance that would become the recorded piece. With only 24 tracks available on the console, the producers also had to be prudent and understand how a complete track was to be constructed to achieve their intended final sound.<br /><br />The story is ultimately one of decline of Sound City as a viable business (it closed in 2011) despite it being the birthplace of countless classic albums produced in the late twentieth century as digital recording appeared and along with drum machines and other digital instruments, allowed people to record direct to a computer. The benefit's of digital recording are clear - the entry level for people making and recording music are massively decreased; the costs are much lower to make a recording; and anyone with a computer can record music. By using a program like Pro Tools you can play a track once then work on your computer to change duff notes, alter the pitch, add a range of effects (curiously with an image of an effects pedal you'll never likely have even seen in real life) and record as many tracks as you care. In short, it's making music for dummies and we've seen a proliferation of music appear as a result, all of it seeking perfection through a processed approach. You actually don't even need to be a musician to make an album these days. No craft, no art, no expertise as such...just working with digital data that equates to music when processed in a particular way.<br /><br />However, as one contributor put it eloquently, there's nothing of the musician in much modern digitally produced music. A huge amount is over-produced with multiple layers of noise. What made music recorded through the Neve board at Sound City so immersive was the imperfections; the fact that you're listening to a real person play a real instrument with all minor imperfections in their playing exposed. It gave the music a 'feel' and a human quality that is difficult to express but which can be easily heard. It's an audible aesthetic and one that cannot be replicated in the same way using modern technology. The same commentator went on to say that yes, music recording has opened up like never before but he challenged us to consider whether it meant there was any better music out there. His thesis was simple..that all that has happened is more people with a lower level of ability or understanding of music (playing, recording, producing) now make music - but that there's a much higher proportion of poor music as a result. It's harder to find the quality any more because quantity sells.<br /><br />Back to cartography - but as anyone who has read my blog before will realise, the above tale is pretty much verbatim my views on a lot of modern mapping. The death of expertise and massively reduced barriers to making maps has given us quantity but has seriously diluted the quality. People are becoming blinded to high quality mapping because they're consistently told to go look at this or that 'great' map by people who probably couldn't tell the difference anyway.<br /><br />So my latest gripe is with the plethora of animated maps of social media data that are using CartoDB's torque engine. I like what CartoDB are doing and their torque engine is a very simple way to animate time-dependent data. But what of the result - how is it being used? Take a look at the following map of how Robert Downey Jr's twitter account gained followers in the first 24hrs after his first tweet:<br /><iframe frameborder="0" height="520" src="http://srogers.cartodb.com/viz/bf5cb538-dacc-11e3-a920-0edbca4b5057/embed_map?title=true&amp;description=true&amp;search=false&amp;shareable=true&amp;cartodb_logo=true&amp;layer_selector=false&amp;legends=false&amp;scrollwheel=true&amp;fullscreen=true&amp;sublayer_options=1|1&amp;sql=&amp;zoom=2&amp;center_lat=19.64258753401308&amp;center_lon=2.98828125%20%E2%80%A6%20pic.twitter.com/TEAYzqAq23" width="100%"></iframe> <br />And the man himself even commented on the map:<br /><blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en">Just spreading light. RT <a href="https://twitter.com/TwitterData">@TwitterData</a> This map shows what happened to <a href="https://twitter.com/RobertDowneyJr">@RobertDowneyJr</a> followers after his first Tweet <a href="http://t.co/EhmewFyAdf">http://t.co/EhmewFyAdf</a><br />— Robert Downey Jr (@RobertDowneyJr) <a href="https://twitter.com/RobertDowneyJr/statuses/466335778986283008">May 13, 2014</a></blockquote><script async="" charset="utf-8" src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js"></script> So what does the map show? I think Downey Jr was spot on...it just shows him spreading light. Actually, it doesn't really show anything at all, except for twitter's absence in China. So a huge global movie star gains followers in places where people live. Are we amazed? And I'll not even bother to go into the pitfalls of the problems of mapping and inferring anything from Twitter data (because I've done that before).<br /><br />Here's another of the tweets that were posted around the recent F.A. Cup Final between Arsenal and Hull City: <iframe frameborder="0" height="520" src="http://srogers.cartodb.com/viz/6338c75e-de66-11e3-8030-0e10bcd91c2b/embed_map?title=true&amp;description=true&amp;search=true&amp;shareable=true&amp;cartodb_logo=true&amp;layer_selector=false&amp;legends=true&amp;scrollwheel=true&amp;fullscreen=true&amp;sublayer_options=1%7C1&amp;sql=&amp;sw_lat=-6.664607562172573&amp;sw_lon=-118.47656249999999&amp;ne_lat=63.704722429433225&amp;ne_lon=134.6484375" width="100%"></iframe> Again...it's just flashing light. What purpose does it actually serve? Visually, I like the effect but it really only shows us that people tweet. And therefore tweets reflect where people are on the planet. And Arsenal are much more popular than Hull City. And perhaps my good friend <a href="https://twitter.com/StevenFeldman" target="_blank">Steven Feldman</a> is the one responsible for lighting up the UK as a twitter loving Arsenal fan?<br /><br />There's just nothing particularly substantive about making maps like this. Once you've seen one you've seen them all. The digital tools make making the map very simple but it doesn't mean we're seeing good maps. It's quite literally a data dump on a map. There's no sorting, sifting, no trying to extract an interesting story or communicate a highlight (no pun intended though this would be a useful thing to do!). Light is cumulative and brighter = more but why are we so fascinated by 'more' of everything?<br /><br />When I look at the map I see flashing light but after a short while I lose sight of the light area (most tweeting in relative terms..and really, the only metric this map is capable of displaying) because the almost strobe effect of the single tweets in the sparse areas becomes more prominent. Is this really the right message? And when the map is saturated with tweets what are we seeing? Anything?<br /><br />I find the story of Sound City and its demise in the face of the onslaught from digital music has many parallels with my area of expertise. Whilst there's no doubt making maps these days is massively improved on many of the older techniques it doesn't necessarily equate to there being better maps. Like Grohl, who is a master of his craft (whether you like his music or not), many musical experts can still find ways to make their music and embrace digital technologies as part of their workflow. Trent Reznor is also a perfect example of this. A musician who knows his craft but is hugely experimental and who can weave modern technology into his work expertly.<br /><br />I'm not decrying technological innovation and progress - just lamenting the decline of the thought that people used to have to put into making a map. If it was worth making it'd take time...and so that cost alone was a good way to decide if making the map was worth the investment. These sorts of maps can be made in minutes but without any sort of cartographic craft you end up making maps of flashing lights that tell us nothing or, as the title of Grohl's last Foo Fighters record stated...you're simply "Wasting Light'.<br /><br />Update 1: there was an interesting side debate on this topic where some were suggesting that frivolous maps are nice once in a while. I agree. Firstly that this sort of animated map of social media data is content frivolous but also cartographically frivolous. It's experimental and at the moment we're in a period of cartographic change where for the first time in a long time technology is outpacing best practice. Experimentation is good and we need to figure out ways to harness these new approaches and to develop new best practices. This is a challenge and one that cartographers need to embrace. Unless they do, all we'll see is more of this type of mapping and more people telling more people how great it is.http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/spreading-light-wasting-light.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-4428674744237781572Sat, 10 May 2014 15:44:00 +00002014-05-10T08:44:12.976-07:00cartofailcartographydesignThe worm is turningThis entire blog is a conduit to encourage better mapping by exploring and providing critique on the dreadful, the mundane, the inaccurate and the sheer bloody hideous maps that we sometimes see. It's about standing up for what's right in my area of professional expertise and trying to reassert the value of high quality cartography (even if it hacks a few people off...which it seems to regularly).<br /><br />For a few years, the over 100 blog posts I've written have sought to explain why bad maps are bad and how they might be far more effective...but over that same period there's also been a dramatic increase in the proportion of poor maps and, more than that, a massive increase in the various media sites that regurgitate, promote and peddle cartocrap and which also contribute through their own less than optimal efforts.<br /><br />But maybe the tide is turning? This week has seen two media sites post articles on the problems with online maps....that's right...the PROBLEMS with online maps. Music to my ears.<br /><br />First, Ben Blatt at Slate wrote an article entitled "<a href="http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/culturebox/2014/04/viral_maps_the_problem_with_all_those_fun_maps_of_the_u_s_plus_some_fun.single.html" target="_blank">Bad latitude: The trouble with viral maps</a>". Then Business Insider's Mike Nudelman and Christina Sturbenz got in on the act with "<a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/the-internets-maps-obsession-2014-5#ixzz31BHOvuDf" target="_blank">The internet is obsessed with maps - here's why it's gone too far</a>". And what prompted all of this? Ironically, it may well be the NBC Nightly News map that caused me such ire I wrote my "<a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/04/changing-face-of-america-bravo.html" target="_blank">Changing face of America</a>" blog post which was then itself used as a basis for the article by John Brownlee in his FastCoDesign blog "<a href="http://www.fastcodesign.com/3029318/design-crime/the-worst-infographic-of-2014-so-far" target="_blank">The worst infographic of 2014 (so far)</a>".<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-1YzBiBnt5cg/U0xzQhG65EI/AAAAAAAAArg/zDnt8eACXGQ/s1600/changingface.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-1YzBiBnt5cg/U0xzQhG65EI/AAAAAAAAArg/zDnt8eACXGQ/s1600/changingface.jpg" height="640" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br />The Changing face of America cartofail was perhaps so awful it may well have jolted people to question what they see a little more; to not be so accepting of every map they see and promote to such huge levels of viral contagion. Maybe, just maybe, some have actually pondered why people like me get so worked up at what all too often appears to be the dumbing down of the art and science of making maps? Or maybe online media has just measured the pulse of horror over this particular graphic and this week we're seeing some sort of reaction.<br /><br />There's probably something else going on...we're possibly just reaching a tipping point. Our social media feeds are absolutely saturated with maps. Really saturated. Just yesterday I saw these two awful efforts:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-etN_B0He-uI/U20fBPA-lhI/AAAAAAAAAuw/uypqqcytYzI/s1600/floating+sheep.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-etN_B0He-uI/U20fBPA-lhI/AAAAAAAAAuw/uypqqcytYzI/s1600/floating+sheep.png" height="428" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><br /></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lTVEAxplJ6I/U20fBD094bI/AAAAAAAAAus/Ivn1Usf4rsc/s1600/gerrymandering.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-lTVEAxplJ6I/U20fBD094bI/AAAAAAAAAus/Ivn1Usf4rsc/s1600/gerrymandering.png" height="428" width="640" /></a></div><br />The first was actually from a 2011 article in The Atlantic by Richard Florida entitled "<a href="http://www.theatlanticcities.com/arts-and-lifestyle/2011/11/mapping-anti-creative-class/488/" target="_blank">Mapping the anti-creative class</a>" that I hadn't seen before (but in social media if something goes around once it inevitably goes round again and again). It's just an abomination. There's no cartographic control been applied at all. It's a load of map-like components dumped on a page. There's no thought to symbolisation, layout or meaning. But it wasn't the map that horrified me so much as the write up which began "Those terrific cartographers over at...". No...NO. This is not cartography. It's been made by someone who clearly shows no cartographic acumen. The reporter clearly has no background in assessing or justifying that comment. It's tantamount to libel to accuse the author of cartography.<br /><br />The second is from an article entitled "<a href="http://www.vox.com/2014/5/8/5695350/this-is-what-america-would-look-like-without-gerrymandering" target="_blank">This is what America would look like without gerrymandering</a>" in Vox by Andrew Prokop. It offers a really odd (and methodologically questionable) way of redistricting the United States that is based on using an algorithm that splits a state in half using the shortest possible line...which they kept repeating until they had roughly the same number of districts as the 'real' map. They are pretty shapes but also pretty meaningless. By repeating the flawed approach they simply propagate the errors at finer resolutions.<br /><br />All of these media sites have been guilty of promoting this sort of stuff. They scrape and aggregate then push it to the unassuming and the uninitiated. In a tiny corner of the world people like me voice our concerns but it's a hard fight against large, loud, noisy voices, likes, pluses and retweets. But what happens when the media get bored of writing the same articles? They tend to take the opposing view. It's a cyclic approach to reportage...it's how so much of news media works. They build something up then knock it down again because then they have something new to write. The 15 minutes of fame that people have yearned for by creating maps they simply want to go viral may just be about to end because the backlash is beginning.<br /><br />There's something ironic about Slate and Business Insider beginning to take a different stand since they have been two of those media outlets more than happy to promote cartocrap in the recent past. I'm not going to quibble though - if they bring this message to more people who then take a more critical eye to their consumption of online maps then that is a good thing. They will hopefully start to become a little more discerning, more demanding. Up to this point, the media have stoked the production of awful maps because they've been behind their promotion. If they begin to take a different approach then maybe people will also begin to think more...to produce work of a higher quality with at least basic construction being applied sensibly.<br /><br />Maybe I'm being a little altruistic. I don't for one minute expect a dramatic shift from quantity to quality. As someone who has, in a very small way, campaigned for better mapping across all facets of my professional and private work in cartography it's a shift I hope has begun. It's a huge ship to turn and there's always people who believe their own facts but maybe if the outlets they rely on to push their work change tack, they may have to revisit their own approach.<br /><br /><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/the-worm-is-turning.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-487712164690354828Thu, 08 May 2014 17:40:00 +00002014-05-08T10:40:14.243-07:00cartographydesignthematicHubble bubble, transparency and troubleI recently wrote a <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/03/cart-oh-nono-1-blending-choropleths-and.html" target="_blank">blog</a> highlighting the problems of using transparency on choropleth maps when they overlay basemaps. Mike Bostock's recently posted "<a href="http://bost.ocks.org/mike/bubble-map/" target="_blank">Let's make a bubble map</a>" provided a really great tutorial on thematic mapping but also highlighted the issue of transparency once again. Here's his final map:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HeKzT1Ch1j4/U2rqgUloE6I/AAAAAAAAAtk/-a9Pr8BESyc/s1600/bostock1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-HeKzT1Ch1j4/U2rqgUloE6I/AAAAAAAAAtk/-a9Pr8BESyc/s1600/bostock1.png" height="390" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br />Look nice? Well yes, at first glance it does. It's clean, modern and pleasing to look at...and remember, these days most people are only glancing at maps so that first visual impression is oh so important. It's not just about looks, it's about the message we see with our eyes and how our brains are interpreting it. The use of transparency on this map creates a confused message because at first glance do you see size as important or darker colours as important? Or both?<br /><br />There's a trend in online mapping in particular that uses transparency as part of the symbology design at every available opportunity. Modifying the alpha channel can be extremely useful and gives us a huge amount of flexibility to design symbols that work, particularly given the interplay of often complex symbology that competes for space. &nbsp;It also allows us to produce some really pleasing effects. The problem here, though, is that applying transparency at an individual symbol level means that where symbols overlap you get darker colours. That's not a desirable effect when we're trying to communicate something about a quantity represented by a variably sized symbol...because it communicates something extra that is meaningless.<br /><br />A proportional symbol is really just a geometric shape that reflects the value of a point or of an area (represented by a point). The overlaps have no spatial meaning whatsoever. Cognitively, we begin to confuse out estimation of magnitude (by seeing size differences) with another estimation of magnitude (lightness or saturation of colour). The use of transparency here creates a pseudo-choropleth effect that demarcates areas of circles as different to one another in some quantifiable sense. It's like seeing a load of stacked Venn diagrams where the overlaps have some additive property we should be mindful of. Except overlaps on proportional symbols are merely a function of proximity of the locations as well as choices made about relative symbol size. Overlaps do not mark out special areas where 'more' of something exists.<br /><br />It's a confusing visual message. Additionally, where we see a large number of smaller symbols overlapping a larger one, the overlapped transparency masks the larger (more important) symbol. Look at the difference between the areas around Los Angeles County CA and then Cook County IL. How many of us miss the large symbol near Cook County because of the overlapping smaller ones? - yet it is similar in size to LA County, which just doesn't have as many counties nearby so doesn't get swamped. The overlaps are far more prominent on the east coast than the west simply due to the geography of there being more counties...but the increased density that we perceive through overlapping symbols causes an additive colour effect overplay the actual data magnitudes. By using transparency we're adding visual heirarchy to the symbols that show smaller darker ones as more prominent. That's at odds with a map like this where larger sizes should be at least on the same visual level.<br /><br />Bostock correctly reorganises his symbols so smaller sit on top of larger. Then, instead of using transparency there are two more useful ways in which overlaps are dealt with to avoid the problems caused by transparency. First, the use of a border the colour of the background of the map is sufficient to demarcate symbols by effectively using cut-out effects. The symbols remain on the same visual level so we simply see the relationship between size and value. Like this:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-yd1l2sQ7Qd0/U2u9rU9H88I/AAAAAAAAAuQ/ia4g740lRbE/s1600/pop_estimate.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-yd1l2sQ7Qd0/U2u9rU9H88I/AAAAAAAAAuQ/ia4g740lRbE/s1600/pop_estimate.png" height="446" width="640" /></a></div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br /><br />Alternatively, hollow symbols with a strong outline might be used. Again, this makes the symbols all sit on the same visual level so we see size of the symbol as the visual variable relaying the information. For this example, the sheer number of symbols may not make this as good an approach but it can be used to good effect in different circumstances depending on the relationship of the geography, data and symbol scaling employed:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kL2UovOhtog/U2u9rgf6wwI/AAAAAAAAAug/XrUwrB441n4/s1600/pop_estimate2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-kL2UovOhtog/U2u9rgf6wwI/AAAAAAAAAug/XrUwrB441n4/s1600/pop_estimate2.png" height="446" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br />Bostock does a lot of other good work in the tutorial, not least pointing out the benefit of a decluttered basemap, or that we may consider using population weighted centroids as well as the need for strong visual anchors in the legend. All solid advice. The <a href="http://bl.ocks.org/mbostock/9943478" target="_blank">final version of his map</a> as a web map adds a hover tooltip and also highlights the county by changing the border to black - a very sensible approach to give clarity to what is selected and to use interactivity in a useful way.<br /><br />While I'm writing this though...there's one other niggle I have...the name: bubble map.<br /><br />The long-standing term used to describe this type of map is a proportional symbol map. Now before someone calls me out on this and points to the fact Bostock notes this clearly at the start and end of the blog well yes, he does (he also refers to it as a graduated symbol map which isn't quite the same). So why persist in pushing a new term when a perfectly good one already exists?<br /><br />Charles de Fourcroy is arguably the first to use proportional symbols in a graphic to show demographic data (<a href="http://www.deconcrete.org/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/Charles_de_Fourcroy-tableau-pol%C3%A9ometrique.jpeg" target="_blank">he used squares</a>...in 1782). We had to wait until 1837 to see proportional width symbols used for<a href="http://www.math.yorku.ca/SCS/Gallery/images/harness-flow.gif" target="_blank">&nbsp;flow maps</a>&nbsp;(Henry Harness). It was probably Charles Minard who then used the technique of making a symbol proportional to a value as part of his differently sized pie charts to show the&nbsp;<a href="http://datavis.ca/milestones//admin/uploads/images/Robinson/viandes.jpg" target="_blank">origin of meats consumed in Paris</a>...in 1851. And map-makers have been making (and calling them) proportional symbol maps ever since.<br />I appreciate Bostock probably wasn't the first to coin the phrase so it's unfair to pick on this example but it's symptomatic of a growing epidemic. Bubble charts are not new. They're proportional symbol maps. How much more perfectly decent cartographic history and relevant terminology is going to be reinvented? The connotation with the word bubble is that the symbols are circles. It's true that most proportional symbol maps use circles because they are often the most suitable (as in 'the perfect shape'). But here's a version with squares:<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tLXI2aF2liE/U2u9rdlFZVI/AAAAAAAAAuY/mAT65TDiz2M/s1600/pop_estimate3.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://3.bp.blogspot.com/-tLXI2aF2liE/U2u9rdlFZVI/AAAAAAAAAuY/mAT65TDiz2M/s1600/pop_estimate3.png" height="446" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div><br /></div><div>OK, I'd agree it's not as pleasing for this dataset but it can have its uses. If and when you use squares, hexagons or any other proportionally scaled symbol to map thematic data do we have do call them bubble maps too...or maybe each map sub-type now gets its own name...squarey map?</div><div><br /></div><div>Anyway, I digress.</div><br />Transparency is your friend as a map-maker, but knowing when not to use it is as important as knowing when it can really help your work.http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/hubble-bubble-transparency-and-trouble.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-1572859713919892586Mon, 05 May 2014 16:57:00 +00002014-05-05T20:02:00.123-07:00cartojunkreviewwebmapAnother day. Another hyperbolic mapHyperbolic - of or relating to hyperbola, an adjective describing something that is overstated or exaggerated. And so to today's hyperbolic map.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-x7BKDf0C3gQ/U2e6lc67LnI/AAAAAAAAAtA/GsQ-QgA5gDc/s1600/isochrone.JPG" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-x7BKDf0C3gQ/U2e6lc67LnI/AAAAAAAAAtA/GsQ-QgA5gDc/s1600/isochrone.JPG" height="406" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br />The work is called <a href="http://isoscope.martinvonlupin.de/" target="_blank">Isoscope</a> and is by students at Postdam University under the guidance of <a href="http://tillnagel.com/" target="_blank">Till Nagel</a>. The write-up is in The Atlantic by <a href="https://twitter.com/citycalfe" target="_blank">John Metcalfe</a> entitled '<a href="http://www.theatlanticcities.com/commute/2014/04/striking-new-way-visualize-mobility/8975/" target="_blank">A striking new way to visualize mobility</a>'. Well...'new' and 'striking'...what a fine way to start a Monday morning. I checked out the article hoping to be cartographically amazed. Only, once again I found myself exhaling a deep sigh. Metcalfe describes Isoscope as a 'beauteous, immersive experience'. He also litters his piece with other glowingly positive terms. It's also Infographic of the day over at <a href="http://www.fastcodesign.com/3029865/infographic-of-the-day/how-easy-is-it-to-get-around-in-your-city-play-with-this-interactive-" target="_blank">FastCo Design</a>. Good grief. Is this hype just the reporting?...<br /><br />I went to the project web site itself to be told Isoscope is an approach to capture the rhythm and pulse of the city; to find the boundaries of reachability, organically. It reveals traffic infrastructure, connectivity and natural boundaries. It's all about mobility and urban morphology apparently. but wait...mobility is way more than how far you can drive in a given time. It's more than cars...it's public transport, it's bicycles, it's the provision of safe bicycle lanes, it's pavements for walking on, it's a reduction in barriers (physical or socio-economic), it's about levels of fitness, disability etc...<br /><br />Now let's be clear here...this is a student project. It's fine. It's teaching people how to use APIs and to make online maps. It's a fairly neat effort but...leave it at that. But no...not only does the project web-site over-inflate the work but then it gets regurgitated by a news media site hunting for any copy it can find to 'amaze' its readers for the few seconds they pass by.<br /><br />Why we have to read about it being the next most amazing thing we've ever seen baffles me. It's not new to people like me. In fact, it's not new to anyone because this sort of work has existed for decades. Now if you are unfamiliar with it, that's a different matter but just because you weren't aware of this type of map does not, in absolute terms make it new. If it's the first time you've seen this sort of map do you not wonder if anything like it has been done before? How do you know what you're seeing isn't a rip-off, or poorly executed? Do you not approach such work with a hint of skepticism or at least a semi-critical mind? If not then you're lost my friend, you will read every new piece of hyperbolic cartography placed before you and neither care of its quality or efficacy. Like anyone, I love to be amazed and to see new and interesting work in my field of expertise. It's what pushes us forward and keeps things interesting. But too much of what gets passed around at the moment is neither new or amazing.<br /><br />In terms of this map, you probably won't care that it's just an isochrone map...a 'service area' that can be calculated from a given point to all other points that fall within a search distance based on some criteria - in this case drive times as specified in a database. The term isochrone was coined by Francis Galton in 1873&nbsp;"[I] propose to employ the word isochrone (equality of time) in a special sense..." (hat-tip to <a href="https://twitter.com/jscarto" target="_blank">Joshua Stevens</a> for reminding me of this). In fact, the use of isolines (lines of equal value) in map-making can be traced back to the 18th century. The Halley isogonic map (below, of magnetic declination) is possibly the first use of contoured curves of equal value. It was published in 1701.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PfDTehrGtOU/U2e6lPl3DUI/AAAAAAAAAs0/Uudz9kJEkB0/s1600/halley-map.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-PfDTehrGtOU/U2e6lPl3DUI/AAAAAAAAAs0/Uudz9kJEkB0/s1600/halley-map.jpg" height="400" width="341" /></a></div><br />That's over 200 years of prior art...and we've been making isoline maps and isochronic maps ever since. Don't believe me? Check out Google Images using the search term '<a href="https://www.google.com/search?q=isochrone+map&amp;source=lnms&amp;tbm=isch&amp;sa=X&amp;ei=1LtnU_jwMIiJogSq6oDgBA&amp;sqi=2&amp;ved=0CAYQ_AUoAQ&amp;biw=1166&amp;bih=812" target="_blank">isochrone map</a>'.<br /><br />So back to the Isoscope application. It's simply a way to show isochrones for certain temporal distances around a point the user adds to the map. It calculates drive times based on a model of traffic condition at different times of the day in relation to the maximum speed limit of the road segments. So it's really a time-slice isochrone map capable of showing us different views at different times. You can also add a 'pedestrian' isochrone to show how far you can walk in a given time. Except it's not very accurate.<br /><br />Here's a 10 minute drive time isochrone around where I used to live in London at peak morning rush hour.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--dkE3hYZ6Po/U2fARzWkzGI/AAAAAAAAAtM/KA-V7peFUv8/s1600/isochrone1.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/--dkE3hYZ6Po/U2fARzWkzGI/AAAAAAAAAtM/KA-V7peFUv8/s1600/isochrone1.png" height="466" width="640" /></a></div><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"></div><br /><br />It's wrong. It's hideously wrong. I added the red squares highlighting a few key junctions where you may be backed up for 20 minutes or longer. These critical junctions in the network would dramatically reshape the isochrones. I know because I needed to get to the University from my house - so much so that I switched to a bicycle and also walked. It took 12 minutes on a bike and about 25 minutes to walk. So let's zoom in and check out the 10 minute pedestrian isochrone.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-7YlTqwQaSkI/U2fAbsPTrNI/AAAAAAAAAtY/O_hodNMY-eE/s1600/isochrone2.png" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-7YlTqwQaSkI/U2fAbsPTrNI/AAAAAAAAAtY/O_hodNMY-eE/s1600/isochrone2.png" height="466" width="640" /></a></div><br /><br />I added the red dashed line - it's a distance of about 1200 feet (360m). That segment of the journey used to take me about 4 minutes. And what happened in the area I marked with a red square? There is no barrier, no impediment to walking to there in about 1 minute from my house. It's just an irrelevant blue blob that does not in any way represent where you can reach within a 10 min walk from my house. However nice you think the map is...it just lied.<br /><br />So the map is, as with a lot of maps, only as good as the data you pour in. Maps made by people in one city, yet creating a map for the whole world because the data exists...except the data is really not very good at doing the one job it's supposed to be doing and no-one bothers to do any ground-truthing or checking. Why? Because we're more interested in creating a beauteous, immersive, new and striking map than being overly concerned about the content (that and it's not really feasible when you're trying to map the world). But wouldn't you check areas you know well? Does the data actually do what it says or not? perhaps some estimation of error might be stated so we can proceed in our own interpretation with caution?<br /><br />In terms of design, the use of a dark basemap and bright, single colour polygon overlays, with a nice dose of transparency isn't particularly striking either. We've seen a lot of maps styled that way recently. &nbsp;Don't get me wrong...I like the look (and have made maps with a similar aesthetic myself)...but it's not new or striking. As for the typography? It's a little clumsy.<br /><br />So, I wonder about all the things I am unfamiliar with that may also be new, or not as the case may be. Open your eyes people...go beyond the rhetoric, the marketing, the tediously simple journalism and learn a little of what you're consuming. A very good student project yes, but not a new or striking map.<br /><br />I wonder what hyperbolic map will drop across my desk tomorrow?<br /><br /><br />http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/05/another-day-another-hyperbolic-map.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8123225361504762353.post-1097666979212427329Tue, 29 Apr 2014 15:30:00 +00002014-04-29T09:08:31.525-07:00cartofailcartojunkFanscape map excitementI was sent a link to the following map by <a href="https://twitter.com/oceankidbilly" target="_blank">Rob Story</a>. I can't bring myself to thank him...it made my eyes bleed and I genuinely do not know where to begin in dissecting it. It goes straight to the top of 2014's worst map so far list...and that's something given we only recently saw the <a href="http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/04/changing-face-of-america-bravo.html" target="_blank">NBC Nightly News abomination</a>. It's from <a href="http://newsweek.tumblr.com/post/84136636390" target="_blank">Newsweek</a>'s Tumblr&nbsp;though tracing the true origin and figuring out who made it is probably a good thing.<br /><br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="http://newsweek.tumblr.com/post/84136636390/ilovecharts-very-helpful-thank-you-tnt-via" target="_blank"><img border="0" src="http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-01Z20Joc-F8/U16iSmUWT7I/AAAAAAAAAsc/Qhs0QczM5WU/s1600/fanscape.png" height="374" width="640" /></a></div><br />What does it show? Who knows.<br />What do the colours mean? Impossible to tell, even on a well calibrated screen.<br />What exactly is being mapped? No idea. I don't even know what sport (probably a Brit ex-pat issue)<br />What data is being used? Nope...dunno. 61% of what? What 'fan votes'?<br />Why map two variables with virtually the same colour? Why? WHY?<br />Why use an unclassed choropleth? Sorry, I give in.<br />Why does 'more' seem to be shown in lighter colours in the two things but the inverse is true? Bad.<br />What is the actual point? Possibly to show how bad a bad map can be?<br />Is it a joke? I sincerely hope so.<br /><br />It is that far from the normal cartofail scale it defines its own scale!<br /><br />Congratulations whoever you are...my opthamologist will be in touch.<br /><br />Update: Thanks to <a href="https://twitter.com/MapHugger" target="_blank">Martin Elmer</a> for pointing out an inaccuracy in the original post. He also points out it could well be a screen grab of an interactive map. Possibly yes...though most of the problems still apply.http://cartonerd.blogspot.com/2014/04/fanscape-map-excitement.htmlnoreply@blogger.com (Kenneth Field)0